Ablaze

by dragonchallenge

Summary:

Aspen Antaeus has escaped the Hunger Games twice. Her body came out of the arena, but her mind is still lost. She has become the face of the rebellion that is raging all across Panem. But there is one thing stopping her from assuming her role as the Mockingjay. Her husband, Cato Hadley, was left in the arena to die. He was taken by the Capitol while Aspen was taken to the underground fortress of District 13. But when Aspen is given proof that he lives on, she joins the fight. And she will not stop. Not until every inch of the Capitol is ablaze.

Chapter 1: Chapter One

They didn't like me very much in District 13. At least, not at night. That was their main reason for keeping me in the hospital for as long as they had. And the fact that I was constantly under some type of sedation. But it was the first issue that was the real problem. Because every night, and multiple times during the day, I would wake up screaming bloody murder. Throwing around every curse that I knew and some that just sounded vaguely familiar at the figures that would try and relax me.

But it never worked. I would thrash around desperately until there was the stick of some needle through my spine. Usually it was Morphling. Just enough to relax me. But then would come the periods of horror. The realization that the Morphling was leaving my system and leaving behind some kind of horror in its wake. Some kind of memory or sometimes the fear that something awful was happening to me. Usually more screaming would bring them back with another dose.

For the first few weeks that I spent in District 13, I didn't even move from the bed. The first week that I was here was full of violent episodes. The doctors would come in to try and speak to me. They would rarely get more than two words out before I would attempt to get up from the bed and murder them. For what they were doing to me, for what they hadn't done for Cato, and just because I was angry. I hadn't done much more than a few scratches and bruises to the doctors, unfortunately.

That had led them to restraining me. I had broken out of them once and had managed to break a finger in the process. That had led to even more restraints. One on each ankle, one on each wrist, one over my forehead, and one across my midsection. I also had a feeling that they were mildly concerned that I would try and kill myself. And they were right about that. So everything was under lock and key. They wouldn't even give me real food, for fear that I would actually try and choke myself with it.

Everything had been given to me through tubes. Water and food. Just to make sure that I was staying alive. And to make sure that I couldn't try and kill myself. It was obvious enough to me and to everyone else that my life wasn't mine anymore. Not that it ever had been. But at least now I knew that it wasn't. Now I knew just how in control they were and how out of control I was. I was in absolutely no control. I never would be. Never. Just the way that I would never see Cato again.

The second week was when the true depression sank in. When the true gravity of what had happened settled in. When I realized just how awful this really was. Everyone knew that I was depressed about Cato and what had happened, but they didn't really care. The truth was that they would never care about me or what I was feeling. The only thing that they cared about was the fact that I was going to be the Mockingjay. Something that they were sorely mistaken about.

The third week was when they finally released the restraints that they'd put on me in the first week. That was when I would start my routine. Waking up in the middle of the night to scream at the top of my lungs from whatever nightmare was plaguing me and dart off before the doctors would hunt me down to bring me back. Try to do something to put me back to sleep. Usually just more of the medicine and something else that would keep me asleep.

My hiding spots were always changing. Since they would find my one spot and then start placing guards there to make sure that I wasn't hiding there anymore. There were now at least ten guards on duty all night to keep an eye on me. Apparently they always wanted to know where the Mockingjay was. I had a feeling that they were debating on placing a tracker in me. But I would rip it out myself if they did something like that. Even if I had to use my fingernails to rip apart my skin and dig it out.

Some days were worse than others. But they were all bad. Some days I just sat and stared at the ceiling. Those were mostly about a week into my evacuation from the arena. I would just lay in bed and stare off into the distance. Dreaming about anything that I could. Anything that didn't make me want to cry. The memories of Cato, mostly. The few ones that I had that were careless. Where the two of us were laughing and felt free. But there weren't many of them. So eventually it just became a loop.

Other days I would fight against the restraints so hard that I was sure that I was going to rip through them. Then the murderous thoughts would begin. The thoughts about how I was going to kill every single person in District 13. All of the doctors that would keep me in the drug-induced haze. The people in Thirteen who never came to the aid of the Districts. Katniss, Gale, Ms. Everdeen, the Hadley family... Everyone. Everyone who knew about the plan and didn't tell me. Haymitch, more than anyone else.

Sometimes it was just tears. Tears that never seemed to end. It was always miserable. I was more depressed each day. It was slowly getting worse and worse. But those days when I just cried, they would sometimes come in droves. I would sob hysterically to the point that I was sure that it was echoing throughout the entire District. Other days they were just silent sobs, the tears running down my face to the point that I thought that I might have drowned myself.

Every night I had the same nightmares. Not all night, usually. Just at intervals. The fear of what the Capitol was doing to Cato, on the off chance that he was still alive. But it had been over a month since the destruction of the arena and there had been no noise from them. That I had heard of, anyways. What were they doing to him? Were they flaying off each piece of skin? Were they starving him to death? Keeping him constantly awake? Beating him to death? Pulling out all of his teeth and fingernails?

Think of something else, Aspen... Something happier...

What would we normally be doing right now? I saw the clock before I fled the hospital. It was just past one in the morning. What would we have been doing? If he was in bed with me. If things were right. Likely he would have just woken me up from some horrible nightmare. This was normally around the time that I would start having them. He would be leaning over me, gently trying to rouse me from my screams of terror, only to keep his arms around me as I shot upright.

Sometimes I would flail and sometimes I would just cry. He would hold me tightly in his arms. I would lay straight in his lap as he ran his hands through my hair and over my legs. Sometimes he wouldn't say anything to me. Sometimes he would whisper reassurances in my ear. But he would always stay awake with me and make sure that I was okay. He must have barely slept two hours a night, because of his own nightmares and because he wanted to protect me from mine.

That was just the way that he was. That was the kind of man that he was. He used to stay awake with me. Sometimes for the rest of the night. Just to make sure that I was okay. To make sure that I wasn't alone. There were times that he would roll us over to spend some time together. There were other times that he would tell me stories or have me tell him stories. We would talk on some nights and stay utterly silent on others, just holding each other. The only thing that mattered was that he was always there.

Protecting me. Just the way that I had been unable to protect him. Just the way that I wished that I could have protected him. Let him live while I went to the meadow. To wait for him. Where I wished that he wouldn't be for many years. As the dry-heaves began, I placed a hand over my stomach and leaned my head back against the cool bars behind me. Where was I? Where had I ended up? My hand bunched over my shirt as I tried to bite back the sobs.

Sometimes I forgot that the pregnancy that Cato announced was just a clever ruse. Sometimes I dreamt that I was, indeed, pregnant. So many questions came with those dreams. Would it have been a boy or a girl? I didn't know. Cato would have been good with a girl. I believed that. What kind of person could they have grown up to be? Would they have been as strong as Cato? As brash as me? Good with a bow and arrow or knives or a sword? Whose talents would they have been given?

For the first time in my life, I found myself wishing that I could have had a kid. Because now I knew that I never would have. Back in District 12, before the Seventy-Fourth Games, it had all been theoretical. And I hadn't loved anymore. Afterwards, when I was with Cato, I had thought that we would have the rest of our lives to be together. But now he was gone. I had never realized, until it was too late, just how much I really did want that future with Cato. A life together. A child.

There was always the one question that came after the rest of them. What kind of parents would we have made? What would we have done with the child? Cato would have made a wonderful father. He loved Leah and Marley. The way that he played with them. He would have loved a child. And he had always told me that I would have been a wonderful mother. I couldn't imagine myself as one, but maybe he was right. Together we could have made it work out. But only together. Now we would never have the chance.

The doctors tried to get me to open up to them about what had happened and what was happening, but there was nothing that I wanted to talk to them about. All of the memories I had of Cato were mine. And they always would be. No matter what people wanted me to say, I would never tell them about Cato. Because he was mine. The memories were mine. And I didn't want anyone else to hear about them. Not the people who had lied and used me. Not the people who didn't understand what he meant to me.

There were a number of things that I had learned about love and being with someone. Things that I learned about being in love, since having lost Cato. Things that my mother never got the chance to tell me. People always seemed to think that a soul mate was your perfect fit. That's what I thought that it was. And it turned out that it was what everyone wanted. But Cato taught me that a true soul mate was a mirror. They were the person who showed you everything that was holding you back.

That was exactly what Cato had done for me. Showed me all of the things that I was doing to hold myself back. He was the one to tell me what I was truly capable. A soul mate was the person who brought you to your own attention so you could change your life. Something that he had done for me. Taught me exactly what it was that I was capable of. Something that I still knew and was fighting to remember. Everything that I was capable of. It was something that I would likely have to work on for the rest of my life.

A true soul mate was probably the most important person that you would ever meet, because they could tear down your walls and smack you awake. That was something that he had done. Literally and figuratively. But to live with a soul mate forever? That was also unfortunately something that I had learned from Cato. It was too painful. Soul mates, they came into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then would leave. Exactly what Cato had done. Not because he'd wanted to.

It was because he had to. Because I should have known that he would. Deliberately or on purpose. A soul mates purpose was to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life, then leave, and leave their memory. Exactly what Cato had done. I just had to find that light. It was there somewhere. But, where?

Cato taught me that love was a fire. But whether it would warm your hearth or burn down your house, you could never tell. Seeing me like this, I think people finally realized the depth of my love for Cato. I wasn't just a silly romantic. I never had been and never would be. I didn't need someone to give me gemstones or gold. I had those things already. I wanted... a steady hand. A kind soul. I wanted to fall asleep, and wake, knowing my heart was safe. I wanted to love, and be loved. Everything that Cato gave me.

All this time I had somehow been seeking that special person who was right for me. But I would have never found someone. Not back in District 12. Because I was so wrong in some way. Wrong for everyone. Maybe that was also why I found Cato, who was also wrong in some complementary way. The whole time when I'd first met Cato and gotten to know him, I knew that he was the wrong person. But not just any wrong person.

He was the right wrong person - someone who I would lovingly gaze upon and think, this is the problem I want to have. And he was the problem that I wanted to have. It was the problem that I'd had for the past year and it was the problem that I would have for the rest of my life. I had found that special person who was wrong for me in just the right way. The two of us had let our scars fall in love. And he was the only one who understood my scars.

Thoughts of Cato were slowly breaking my heart. And there was no one who I could confront about it. Because my trust had been completely broken. I didn't trust anymore. No one who had known what was happening between Cato and me. And that was every single person here. Everyone had known the truth. But no one had said anything. And I particularly didn't trust myself. I could barely trust what was real that I was seeing and what wasn't. The medicine messed with my head.

And then there came the hate... The way that I hated everyone. Every single person. The people who I hadn't met here in Thirteen. The doctors and nurses who always talked to me. Everyone in the Capitol. Everyone in the Districts. The entire Hadley family. Haymitch... so much. All of the surviving Victors. Seneca Crane and Plutarch Heavensbee. President Snow. My entire family. Gale. His family. Even Cato, for trying so hard to save me and let himself die.

But there was no one that I hated more than myself. Not a single damn person. Because I felt like everything was my fault. I felt like the entire uprising was my fault. Everything that was happening in the Districts. All of the innocent people who had died. The fact that District 12 was now nothing more than a smoldering pile of ash. The fact that Cato was either dead or in the Capitol. Or the worst thing that had happened since I had learned that I was rescued and Cato was taken.

It was a little over a month ago. Not long after I had gotten to District 13. It was just after Gale and Katniss had told me what had happened in District 12. I had been trying to cope with everything. No one had come in to visit me after them. Mostly because I had asked them to stay away. All of my visitors. But eventually the Hadley family had come to visit me for the first time. It was the only time that they had visited me since arriving in District 13.

For the past... how long had it been? Forever? That was what it had felt like. I was just sitting on some bed. Maybe in the hospital wing. I couldn't really be completely sure where I was. The horror from everything had passed. The horror from the loss. Now it was only a numb feeling. The horror would return eventually. Just not now. I barely spoke and didn't move. I was hoping and trying to die from the lethargy. Cato's family had wanted to come and visit me but I had denied them every time. Now my requests were being overridden.

Suddenly the door opened and the Hadley family strolled into the room. They had warned me that they were coming. I had no option for them to come. Aidan, Leah, and Marley were not with them. I had a feeling that they were too young for the family to want them to see me like this. Had they even been told what had happened? Skye and Julie were there. Their eyes were red. All of them. They had been crying. I tried to look away desperately. I didn't want to see them. Never.

The last thing that I wanted was to deal with them. Not after everything that had happened. Not when they knew that Cato was likely dead, and he was dead because they had tried to save me. I didn't want to know how they must have felt. They must have been here to yell at me. Maybe try to kill me. I wouldn't stop them. I would beg for them to do it. The Hadley family slowly moved around the bed, looking down at me, with Alana and Carrie standing the closest to the bed.

"I told them to not let you in," I said, staring up at the ceiling.

"They thought that it was time that you started speaking to people again," Alana said.

"I don't want to speak to anyone. I don't want to speak to you. Leave me alone," I muttered.

Carrie laid a hand on my shoulder and I jerked away. "Don't pull away from us, Aspen. You need to be around your family right now," she whispered, tears brimming in her eyes.

"I don't have a family. My family died in the Fifty-Fifth, Fifty-Seventh, and Seventy-Fifth Hunger Games," I said.

"We’re still your family. Cato was your family. We’re his. We’re yours," Carrie said.

"Leave," I growled.

Dean stepped forward. He didn't touch me, but he was close. "Aspen... We’re hurting. Of course. Just like you. But we can’t do this alone. You can’t do this alone. We lost Cato. Don’t make us lose you, too," Dean said softly.

"You’d be better off without me," I said.

"Maybe. But we don’t want to be without you," Alana said.

"We don’t blame you, Aspen. No one blames you," Damien said, surprising me.

If I had thought that anyone would blame me, I had thought that it would be Damien. "You should," I said.

"We knew, Aspen," Skye said, speaking in a soft voice that was usually reserved for telling little children bad news. "We knew about the plan. We knew that they needed to get you. We knew that Cato was only a maybe. We were hoping that he would get out, of course, but we knew that it was very likely that we wouldn’t see him again."

"So you, just like everyone else, failed to tell me," I growled under my breath.

"It was for -" Julie started.

"Your own safety," I finished, interrupting her. The same thing that so many people had told me over the past few days. "So I’ve heard. You should have taken him. He was the right person to save."

"You’re here, Aspen. We’re here. Let’s try and make the best of it," Julie said, making me laugh humorlessly. "We can join the rebellion. End the Games and the Capitol’s rule forever."

"The Games will never be over," I said.

"They might be," Carrie said.

The entire family exchanged a little look with each other. Now I knew that the berating was coming. "We’re having a funeral, Aspen. We’d really like for you to be there," Alana said.

"Why? There’s no body to bury," I said heartlessly.

They hadn't saved him. They hadn't saved their own family. They deserved to hear it, as much as I knew that it was the wrong thing to say. Alana pressed her head into Damien's shoulder and sobbed. I should have said something, I should have said that I was sorry for my words. But I couldn't. Because I was so angry and so dead to the world. All because they hadn't kept their promise to me. They hadn't saved him, even when they had said that they would.

"It’s not for Cato," Damien said slowly.

"So..." I muttered.

Eventually I trailed off. My gaze flitted around the people in the room for the first time. I looked at them. I really looked at them. Before I hadn't cared, but now... Now I cared. Because at least one of them was dead. More than Cato. Someone else in the family was dead. The kids were missing. I had thought that they were being taken care of. But were they all dead? Three, seven, and eleven years old. Not even old enough to be in the Games. They couldn't be dead. Cato's family had lost enough.

"Where are the kids?" I asked, the first hint of emotion seeping into my voice in a long time.

"Aidan and Marley are being watched by one of the women in the nursery," Alana said.

"And Leah?" The family remained silent, all staring down at the ground. "Where is Leah?" I repeated, more sternly this time.

"It was while we were evacuating District 2," Dean said, stepping in when he noticed that his parents couldn't. "Just after the power to the arena went out. We already knew that we had to leave. A hovercraft was waiting for us. They were enforcing martial law on District 2. We were trying to sneak into the woods. It was the middle of the night. The Peacekeepers saw us as we attempted to flee. They were shooting. We were running. One stray bullet. That was all that it took. Straight to the brain."

"I was carrying her. We think that they were aiming for my heart. They didn’t see her," Damien explained.

My hands were bound to the bed from a violent episode the other day. I wasn't able to cover my mouth as a sob escaped from deep in my throat. Leah. Sweet little Leah was dead. All because District 2 had enforced a martial law because of my relationship with Cato. They were trying to flee so that they could get to me. And maybe Cato. That time I couldn't help the strangled sob that escaped me. Another member of the Hadley family was dead. Little Leah, who called me the pretty girl on the television.

"They’ve agreed to allow us a funeral for her," Alana said, tears running down her face. "We would -"

"Get out," I interrupted.

My heart was pounding. "Aspen -" Carrie started.

"Get out," I repeated.

The world was swooping and sweat was breaking out on my forehead. "Her heart rate and blood pressure are rising. Let’s give her a moment. Let her process the information. She may need some time," a doctor said, sounding like he was a thousand miles away.

"It’s okay, Aspen. We don’t blame you," Carrie said.

They needed to be gone. Far away from me. I couldn't look at them. Not now and not ever. "Get out. Get out!" I screamed, desperately thrashing around, needing to run. The doctors reached out for me. "Get off of me! Let go!"

"Please. She needs to be sedated. Perhaps we can try again later," the doctor said.

The Hadley family was staring at me. I could see them giving me frightened and heartbroken looks. But I didn't care. I wanted them far away from me. Where I could never see them again. Where I could never feel this guilt again. I was screaming at the top of my lungs and thrashing against everyone who was trying to sedate me. There was a pinch in my neck as I tried to break the restraints. I just killed a little girl. Cato's little sister. The girl who he had promised to spend his first day back from the Games with.

They had been forced to keep me sedated for most of the next few days. Each time that the Morphling had worn off I had started screaming to try and break the restraints. Because I'd wanted to be gone. Somewhere where I could never hurt anyone again. It was horrible, hearing everyone start to plan a seven-year-old's funeral. A funeral that I had caused. I didn't actually end up going, but Katniss had tried very hard to get me to go.

The restraints were finally gone as I was back to numbness. The door burst open suddenly and Katniss strolled in. "Come on. Get up. It’s time for the funeral," Katniss said.

"I’m not going," I said determinedly.

"You are. Come on. You can come back right after. You don’t have to speak to anyone but you do need to be there," Katniss said.

"You go. I’m not."

"I’m not family. I’m going because they’re friends. That is your family out there and they’ve asked that you be there. Because Leah loved you."

"And look how much good that did for her," I mumbled.

Katniss stood at the edge of the bed and shoved my foot. "Get up. We’re going. Now," she snapped.

"Go away."

"No. Your family is out there. They want you there."

"I don’t have a family."

Something shot through Katniss's eyes. "Yes. You do. I am your sister," she said softly, placing her hand against my leg, which I jerked away. "They are your family, too."

They would have told me the truth if they were my family. "You have one sister. Prim. And they were only family through marriage. Not even a real one. It’s dissolved now. He’s dead. Or as good as dead," I said cruelly.

Katniss sighed and ran a hand through her hair. "Okay... I have tried to be nice because I know that you're hurting. No more. You’re going to get up and get out there. Because that is a seven-year-old girl who looked up to you. Do it for her if you can’t do it for anyone else," Katniss snapped, yanking at my arms.

"That’s it!" I shouted, raising my voice for the first time since they had told me that Leah was dead. "A seven-year-old girl who looked up to me. Who I killed."

"You didn’t kill her," Katniss said softly.

"No. The Peacekeeper did. But it might as well have been my finger on the trigger," I muttered.

"You need to be there. They lost their son. They lost their daughter. They don’t need to lose you."

"Yes, they do. They’d be better off with me dead."

"Well, I wouldn’t. And they want you there. Get up, Aspen!" Katniss shouted, yanking at me again. I harshly kicked out at her. "I don’t care if you hate me. Hate me all you want. Just get up!"

"Leave me alone," I snarled.

But I should have known that she wasn't going to give up that easily. Katniss stormed back up to my bed and grabbed me by the arm. Immediately I shoved her backwards. She stumbled back and nearly collapsed over herself. But she managed to straighten up at the last second and scowl at me. I merely stared back at her. She stomped back up to me and grabbed me by the arm. That time I shoved her back but she managed to hold onto me. Just a moment later we began shouting at each other.

"Get the hell off of me!" I barked.

"Get up!" Katniss ordered.

The last thing that I wanted was to be at a seven-year-old girl's funeral. I just wanted to be left alone to die. Why wouldn't they let me die? Katniss was slowly pulling me from the bed and I reached back for a vase that was holding flowers that had been laid out for me. I took it in my hands and threw it at Katniss, before I could think better of it. The glass shattered against her arm and cut her up slightly, slicing through the jumpsuit. My anger was dissipated, replaced with shock at what I had just done. Katniss looked shocked, too.

Katniss wiped off a little bit of the blood on her arm. "Okay. Fine. I’ll tell them that you send your regards," she panted.

"Miss Everdeen," the doctor said, walking in and placing a hand on Katniss's arm. "Please let Miss Antaeus sleep."

Katniss nodded, still staring at me. We hadn't broken eye contact. "Alright. You might hate me right now. You might hate me for the rest of your life. But I’m still your sister. I always will be," she said softly.

Then she was gone. Later on I saw pictures and videos of the funeral. I didn't want to see if but the doctors felt that I should. It had just ended up launching me into a tirade and I'd been forced to be given more Morphling to put me back to sleep. I hadn't gone and spoken to the Hadley's about their newest loss. I felt no desire to be near them or see them. My hands were shaking even worse as I stared into the darkness. How long had I been here? Where was I?

What do you know, Aspen? What do you know?

Nothing. I knew nothing. The truth made no sense. What was the truth? Think straight. That was hard because the effects of the concussion Johanna Mason gave me with the coil of wire hadn't completely subsided and my thoughts still had a tendency to jumble together. Also, the drugs they used to control my pain and mood sometimes made me see things. I guessed. I still wasn't entirely convinced that I was hallucinating the night the floor of my hospital room transformed into a carpet of writhing snakes.

It was enough to send me into a hysterical state that had taken hours to bring me down from. Even after it had all ended I had found myself nervous at the slightest movement. Everything made me nervous these days. Everything made me jumpy and terrified and mistrusting. I used a technique one of the doctors suggested. I started with the simplest things I knew to be true and worked toward the more complicated. The list began to roll in my head....

My name is Aspen Antaeus. I am twenty years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games. I escaped. The Capitol hates me. Cato was taken prisoner. He never got the chance to turn twenty. He is thought to be dead. Most likely he is dead. It is probably best if he is dead...

Tears slowly began to flow as I brought my knees up to my chest and started to breathe a little heavier. My chest was now heaving as my entire body began to quake. My nightmare had been a recurring one. It was the image of Leah, bloody and dead in her mother's arms. Too late to save her. Too late to do anything but watch, knowing that it was my fault. Then Cato had come, trying to kill me for killing his little sister.

Suddenly the world began to shift. My heart was pounding and my head was spinning. The vomit was slowly building in the back of my throat. The scream built up in the back of my throat, coming straight from the tips of my toes. My vision was now becoming blurry. It felt like I was back under the influence of the Tracker Jacker venom. But it was worse. Because this time it was real. I thought so, at least. Because right now I couldn't tell what was real and what was fake.

Slowly I started rocking back and forth. "Start simple. Start with what you know is true. My name is Aspen Ha… Antaeus. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games. I escaped. Cato... Cato was left behind," I whispered, my voice breaking.

There was a loud clang and suddenly a bright light. I whipped around, terrified for what was coming for me. Then I turned back, hiding behind the bars. "Miss Antaeus? You can't be in here," a woman called.

My breathing was still labored. "I had a nightmare. Just five more minutes," I called back, not moving from my spot.

"You need to sleep. We can help you sleep," the woman said.

"Just five more minutes," I said, fighting back tears. "No. No, please, don't. It's just five more..." The woman laid a hand on my shoulder. "Don't touch me! Don't! No! No! Get off of me!"

The woman was yanking me away from the tubes and pipes that I was hiding behind. I was trying desperately to grab onto them and stay here, far away from everyone else, but I couldn't. I was losing my grip on the beams. Suddenly a figure stepped in and pried the woman off of me. My screams were still echoing as Katniss leaned down and pressed a hand against my face. She picked me up and shoved the woman with the flashlight back away from me.

"Let her go! Now," Katniss demanded.

Slowly I tried to get away, to crawl somewhere that they couldn't find me, but they wouldn't let that happen. Katniss grabbed my shoulder and picked me up with her. She was trying to keep my head in her shoulder so that I didn't have to look into the light. I shoved her off of me and yanked myself away from Katniss desperately. Almost immediately I collapsed back to the ground. I tried to fight Katniss off and shove her away from me. I didn't want anyone touching me.

No one was supposed to touch me. No one was allowed to touch me. The only person's hands that I wanted on me were Cato's. And I would never feel that again. There wasn't a damn person that I wanted putting their hands on me. Not even Katniss. Not anymore. Because I was still so furious with her. I would likely always be angry with her. Because I was furious with everyone. Especially those who I was supposed to trust above all others.

"Come on," Katniss said, hushing me.

"Get off of me," I sobbed, trying to push her away.

"Come on. It’s okay. We’re bringing you back. To get some sleep," Katniss whispered.

"I hate you," I said through tears.

"I know. But that doesn’t change the fact that I love you. And I always will. Come on," Katniss said.

Slowly I started pushing back against her. But it wasn't easy. I was weak from my long days in bed and lack of food. "Stop. Don’t touch me," I begged, trying to get away from her.

"Come on. It’s time to go back to bed," she said.

So we slowly started walking down the hall. One of her arms was on my shoulder while the other was around my waist. She was keeping me locked firmly in place against her. I started sobbing even harder as Katniss grabbed my head and pushed it down against her shoulder, running her hands through my hair. She was pushing it back into place as she gently dropped me into my hospital bed. Katniss then crawled in with me. Just like she used to do when we were kids.

"You should have told me," I cried.

I saw the tears rising in the back of Katniss's eyes. "I know, Aspen. I know that I should have told you. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I tried to fight the longest to tell you both. But I knew that they were right. It was safer for you not to know. God, I’m so sorry," Katniss said, crying with me.

"Cat..." I whispered desperately.

There was nothing else I could say or do. "I’m so sorry, Aspen. I hate them, too," Katniss said.

And she laid back in the bed, letting me sob into her shoulder. We were curled up together, just as we did after Mr. Everdeen died. For just tonight we were allowed to be those little kids that had lost their father. She was stroking my hair back into place as I wet her shoulder with tears. It was the first time in a month that I had genuinely let all of my emotions come to surface. We both cried together - myself for my loss and Katniss for me - as she hushed me, keeping my head in her shoulder.

I wasn't sure what time I fell asleep. Or even if it was sleep. I just knew that I was somewhere distant, no longer in District 13. Actually, I was back in District 12. It was the first good dream that I'd had in a long time. The first dream in a long time that hadn't involved Cato. It was a memory of being back in school one day. We were younger at the time. A little friendlier. Happier. I was fifteen. Katniss was thirteen. I had gotten bored in class and had gone to see Katniss, who was in lunch at the time.

"Ladies," I chirped, walking into the lunch room and dropping in between Katniss and Madge.

Katniss whipped around to stare at me. "What are you doing here? You should be in class," Katniss hissed.

"Whatever," I said, shrugging her off and stealing a strawberry from Madge, who laughed. "I got bored of listening to how wonderful the Capitol was. Figured I’d come see what you were up to."

It was the weekly lecture on the history of Panem. Today we had been talking about how the Capitol was so strong and unbeatable. How the Districts were fools for trying to rise up during the Dark Days. It had been infuriating to listen to them. Every week for years at a time. I didn't want to have to hear it anymore. So I had feigned feeling sick to go to the bathroom. The teacher had let me out and I'd decided to see what Katniss was up to.

"You’re going to get in so much trouble," Madge said, giggling.

"Worth it," I said.

"Why is that guy staring at you?" Katniss asked.

She was turned back towards another table. I was curious what she was looking at. Some boy. Obviously not in my year. I turned back and saw that it was a boy who was obviously from the merchant sector. Long blonde hair and blue eyes. I recognized him. His family owned one of the coal distribution plants. He was very wealthy. Sixteen, from what I could remember. I didn't know his name but I knew that he was friendly with Peeta Mellark, the boy who had saved my life. He was smiling at me.

I turned back and shrugged my shoulders. "I don’t know," I said.

Madge snorted and looked back at the boy briefly. "Because he’s never seen her. You’re not in this lunch period," Madge explained.

Which was the truth. Twelve, thirteen, sixteen, and seventeen-year-old's ate together. I ate with the fourteen, fifteen, and seventeen-year-old's. "Gross," I muttered.

"I think that you’re the only girl besides us that never cares that boys look at her," Madge said.

"I’ve got no reason to care," I said, shrugging.

"Better things to worry about," Katniss said.

"Exactly," I agreed.

"Well you are really pretty, Aspen," Madge said.

Turning to her, I raised a brow. "What do you want?" I asked.

"Nothing!" Madge chirped.

It was one of the few times that I had genuinely felt like she was a real friend. One of the times where I wasn't concerned that she might rat out Katniss and me about what we were doing. The three of us threw our heads back and laughed. It wasn't uncommon to see Madge laughing. She usually did, but with her friends in the merchant sector. Katniss and I rarely laughed. At least, in public. So to see the three of us laughing together in public was something very strange.

"So we shouldn’t hold our breath for Aspen Antaeus’ wedding?" Madge asked, once we had calmed down.

"Nope, I’ve got my sisters with me. That’s all I need," I said happily.

Madge smiled as I wrapped an arm over Katniss's shoulder, who rolled her eyes at me and threw my arm off. "The one girl in the world that will never suffer a heartbreak," Madge laughed, eating her roll of bread.

"Oh, yeah?" I asked.

"Yeah. Because you’ll never get that attached to someone," Madge said.

"Good," I said.

Katniss rolled her eyes. "Well if you do, I’ll be there for you," she said.

I turned to her, surprised. "Will you?" I asked.

"Sure. Laughing and telling you to get the hell over it," Katniss said.

We all laughed again, something that drew attention from everyone all over the dining room. "And that’s why I love you," I said, wrapping my arm back over her shoulder.

"Miss Antaeus!" a loud voice shouted. All three of us jumped apart as I turned back to see the basic math teacher standing behind us. "I don’t believe that this is your lunch period. Is it?"

"Wow..." I gasped softly, feigning looking around the dining room. "You’re right. I was wondering why all of these people didn’t look familiar. My apologies."

"Go to class," the teacher snapped.

"Yes, ma’am," I said, jumping up and darting back to the classroom.

When I woke up the next morning, there was a brief moment of happiness that was associated with the memory. It reminded me of the way that I had woken up after that night with Cato in the arena. The way that I had felt, so happy for just that moment. But like that day in the arena, I quickly felt the depression seep back into my bones. Because the truth of what was happening came back to my mind. And right now I realized just how horrible that memory was. At least, in regards to what was happening now.

Because I did fall in love with someone. Harder and faster than I had ever thought was possible. And Katniss knew that. She was the one person who genuinely knew what my true feelings were for Cato. She knew just how deeply they ran. I knew that, right now, Katniss would never dare make fun of me. Likely not ever. Not about this, at least. Because she knew just how hurt I was about the loss of Cato. How hurt I would always be, even as years passed, if I was still alive.

Slowly forcing myself to peel my eyes open, I turned back and glanced over. Katniss was still in bed with me. I would have thought that she had left to go back to wherever she was staying once she had realized that I was good and asleep. It was the first time that someone had stayed with me overnight, with the exception of when Gale and Katniss told me about the fate of District 12. It was almost strange to see someone in my bed other than Cato, even though Katniss and I used to share one.

That was also when I realized that someone was standing above me. Someone who wasn't a doctor. They would have woken me up to start running the tests that they normally did in the morning. I jumped slightly when I realized that it wasn't someone that I knew. I was about to scream for Katniss when I realized who it was. Someone that I did know. They were standing above me, smiling, wearing a white suit, just the way that he was the last time that I saw him a number of months ago.

"Peeta..." I whispered. For a moment I glanced back at Katniss. She was still sleeping. Had I finally overdosed on Morphling, as I had been trying to do before? "Am I dead?"

"No. Not yet," Peeta said.

"I wish I was," I mumbled.

"I know. Remember when I visited you after the Quell was announced?"

"Yes."

Of course, it had been a dream after I had passed out from a big hit to the head. "I came because I thought that you needed someone to visit you. That's why I’m here now. I thought that you needed to talk to someone. Anyone but the people here," Peeta said, motioning around us.

"I hate them all," I said, the weakness in my voice distracting from the hostility in my words. "They all knew. No one told me."

"I know. I understand how much you hate them," Peeta said.

"Why didn't they tell me?" I asked him, knowing that he wouldn't have an answer.

"Because they thought that it would be safer. And it very likely is safer. Because at least he can keep you safe if he doesn’t know where you are," Peeta said.

That was when I realized that he would know the truth. Whether or not Cato was alive. He had to know. He was my last option. "Is he alive?" I asked Peeta desperately.

"I can’t tell you that," Peeta said regretfully.

"Peeta, please," I begged.

"You will find out. I promise."

We sat in silence for a moment as he smiled down at me. "Are you in the meadow?" I finally asked.

Peeta smiled. "Yes," he said.

"Is Rue there?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Keep her safe."

"I'll keep her safe. I promise. I'll keep them all safe. You just keep yourself safe," Peeta said.

"And the people?" I asked.

No one cared if I was safe. The only thing that mattered to them was that the people were safe. And I could die for them, as far as the leaders of the rebellion died. "My only concern is you," Peeta said.

"I can't be the one who does this. It should have been Cato. It should have been you. You were always so good with words," I said, making Peeta smile. He always had been the best public speaker that I had known. Cato was a close second. "I can't do it. I can’t say what they need me to. I can’t do what they need."

"I wouldn’t bet on that," Peeta said, giving me a small smile. "Why would people have followed you in the first place?"

"Because I’m brainless," I said, accidentally repeating what Johanna had called me so many times. "I do things first and think second. It’s what got me in so much trouble in the first place."

Peeta grinned down at me. "You’re so strong, Aspen. Don’t let them take that away from you," he said.

"I’m not strong, Peeta," I whined.

"You are. And know that, no matter what, you’re my Mockingjay," Peeta said. I let out a little breath. I couldn't be the Mockingjay. "No matter what you decide to do."

"I wish you were here," I whispered softly.

If there was anyone that I wanted here more than Cato, it was Peeta. But it was too late for that. "I am, Aspen. Always. Right here," Peeta said, pressing a hand against my chest, right over my heart.

"Aspen. Who are you talking to?"

It wasn't Peeta who had just spoken to me. I whipped back around to see that Katniss was staring at me. She was awake now and staring at me like I had lost my mind. Which maybe I had. She looked like she was trying to wipe the sleep out of her eyes. Had my voice woken her up? When I was talking to... Peeta! I whipped back around and realized that Peeta was gone. I was just imagining things. My hands were shaking again. It was the medicine, making me hallucinate.

"Peeta..." I answered her.

Katniss leaned forward and pressed a hand against my leg. "Aspen... Peeta’s not here. He died a year ago," Katniss said, her voice shaking. She didn't like talking about Peeta.

"I know. I know. Just imagining things," I said, trying to shake the feeling of his touch.

"I'm going to go get you something to eat," Katniss said.

I had a feeling she just wanted to walk away for a minute and catch her breath. "I don't want anything," I muttered.

"Well, you have to. I'll be back in a few minutes," Katniss said.

"Okay."

She would have gone to get me food even if I had told her that I didn't want any. I likely wouldn't eat whatever it was that she wanted to get me, but if it made her feel better, I supposed that I could let her. I had spent too long pushing everyone away from me. If nothing else, I could at least try letting some people back in. Katniss, Gale, Ms. Everdeen, and Prim... The people who had always been there for me. Maybe the Hadley's, too, in time.

Slowly I leaned back against the bed. I wanted so desperately to get up and do something. I was sick of feeling useless. But there were always those lingering thoughts. The thoughts about him. I let out a soft breath as I stared up at the ceiling. Was Cato dead? I hoped that he was, as much as I hated to admit it. What were they doing to him if he was alive? It would definitely be something to make him wish that he was dead. His words from the day we got back to the Capitol echoed in my head.

You deserve better than me. You're going to win these Games and go home. You'll never lose anything again.

But I had lost something. I'd lost the thing that mattered most. Him.

I love you. I wish that we would have worked out. I wish that more than anything. I would have married you. Without hesitation. Just know, you are the only person that I've ever loved. You are the only person that I could ever love.

Just like he was the only person that I could love. I could feel my heartbeat speeding up as I thought of him, as I so often did. "Cato... Where are you?" I whispered to the roof.

"Dead. Just the way that you wish that you were," a sudden voice called.

My head turned downwards and I saw that Brutus was standing at the foot of my bed. "Go away. I am not in the mood to talk to you," I snarled.

It was the way that we had always been. I had always hated Brutus. And he had always hated me. From the moment that we had seen each other. He was an asshole who had loved the Games. But now I realized who Brutus really was. Someone who enjoyed fighting, but not the complete control that the Capitol had. I assumed that seeing what had happened to Cato over the past year was enough to turn Brutus off to the Capitol. It was why he was on our side now.

He was one of the only people that completely ignored my feelings. He completely hated me and couldn't have cared less about how much I was hurting. It was something that I almost appreciated. I was sick of people treating me like a broken doll. Brutus never did. He was also the only person who had kept his promise. Brutus had promised Cato that he would keep me safe, as Cato had begged him to. And Brutus had done just that, as much as he probably wished that he hadn't.

"I don't think that you've really been in the mood to talk to anyone these days," Brutus commented.

"So take the hint," I snapped.

"Listen to me," Brutus started, ripping the blankets off of me. I groaned and looked up at him. "Cato was willing to die for you. He'll be thrilled that you made it out of that arena. He was willing to do anything to keep you alive."

"I don't care. I wanted him to live. Haymitch swore to me that he would," I growled.

"You should have known that Haymitch was going to go back on his word."

"Of course I should have. But I didn’t. You were the only one that did what you said you would do. You said that you would keep me safe and you did."

"Trust me, I would have much rather saved him. I hate you."

Sparing my feelings, as always. "I do, too," I snapped.

Brutus sighed and took a seat on the edge of the bed. I had the overwhelming urge to kick him in the head. "But... I do love Cato, in my own way," Brutus said. I was just reminded of the moment that Cato had attacked Brutus for insulting me. But, like Brutus had said, their love was in their own way. "I've known him since he was a baby. Watched him grow up."

"So I've heard," I commented.

"He loved you. More than I've ever seen someone love someone else. He used to wake up in the middle of the night screaming. Couldn't calm down unless we could convince him that you were alright. His only concern was that you were alright. He was so afraid for you," Brutus told me.

Had he really done that? Cato had told me that he did. He had told me about it the day before the Interviews. When we had been up on the roof after Haymitch had kicked us out of the living room. He had been so angry with us. But Cato had mentioned it to me. That Carrie or Dean would usually have to come and calm him down because he was so sure that the Capitol had done something to me. And then he had gotten that picture of us. On my birthday last year.

"By the way, Aspen. Try not to die anymore. It's getting a little tiring saving you."

"Sure thing. Try not to kiss me again unless it's without a pill."

Cato grinned at me. He surprised me by sliding back into the cave and grabbing me around the waist. I gasped as he pulled me against his own chest and held me in a searing kiss. He leaned me back against the rocks as he pushed his hands through my hair. It was a little painful but I did enjoy it. I had never been kissed like that. His hands were tight around me as my heart hammered in my chest. We were together for a few moments before he pulled away and pressed a final kiss on my lips.

"Like that?" Cato asked.

There was something almost soft in his eyes. "Yeah... Like that," I whispered.

That kiss. That kiss had stunned me. It was the first one, genuinely the first one, that I had really been all there for. The kiss after the wolf mutt had been mostly for Sponsors. The one after the Careers had unknowingly trapped me in the tree had been amazing, but it was half so that I could get away from him and half because I was shocked that he had done it. And the one up on the roof I still hadn't been expecting. And I hadn't been in love with him yet. That kiss had been the one to really undo me.

Now my birthday had already passed. And I had been in a Morphling induced haze. I had been practically dead. Maybe I had been passed out for my entire birthday. All I knew was that I wanted him back. I wished that we could have spent my entire birthday together. Doing something actually fun. Actually being in love with each other with no worries about anything else in the world. The tears brimmed in my eyes as I remembered that kiss and each one that had followed.

"I want him back, Brutus," I whispered, allowing myself the momentary weakness.

"I know, kid. I do, too," Brutus said, surprising me.

I had thought that he was going to insult me. But he only gave me a bitter smile. "How do we get him back?" I asked.

"We don’t even know if he’s alive, Aspen," Brutus said, probably trying to be gentle.

Recently I had realized that he was likely still alive. Wishing that he was dead, though. "They'll keep him alive. To torture me, I'm sure. Maybe to try and lure me in, hoping that I'll come and save him," I said softly.

"Yes. You’re probably right about that. But he'll be dead soon enough," Brutus said, almost reassuringly.

"That's all I can think about, all of the time. What are they doing to him? How much are they hurting him?" I admitted.

"Don't do that to yourself. You can't think like that. All you can think about is what you can do to help him," Brutus said.

"Die," I deadpanned.

"No. That's what you would do to help me," Brutus said. I scowled at him. But the comment did make me feel a little amused. Not happy, but I felt something. More than I had in a while. "To help him, you have to help us. Overthrow the Capitol. Destroy them. Just the way that they've destroyed you. You do that and you free Cato."

"If he's still alive," I muttered.

"If he's still alive," Brutus agreed.

"I can't, Brutus. I can't do what they want me to do."

"Why not?"

There were so many reasons. The list went on and on. "Because that's not me. I can't be the Mockingjay. I'm just... Aspen. I'm just some idiot that shoots first and thinks later," I said.

Every action that I made was without thinking. Each time that I did something, I just reacted. My thoughts were never fast enough to catch up with my body. The moment that I had volunteered. All I'd known was that Prim would die if she went and I couldn't let Katniss do it. The many little comments that I'd made to Cato. Each of my reactions out of anger during my private sessions. The flowers for Rue. The knives at the Death Match. Everything. I was the kind of person who acted first and thought... sometimes never.

"Yes. You are," Brutus admitted, making me scowl. "And that’s what makes you right for the job."

"I don't understand," I said dumbly.

"That's why people love you. That's why they support you. Because you're just like them. Just some kid that got sick of the Capitol ruling everything. That's why you're so important to them. Because you are them. Because if you can do it, so can they," Brutus explained.

And I understood where they were coming from. But that didn't mean that I could save them. I couldn't. "But I can't do it. Not anymore. I tried, Brutus... I tried," I said weakly.

"Not hard enough. And if Cato was here, he would be telling you the same thing. Get it together, girl," Brutus sneered harshly. "You love your husband?"

"Yes," I answered, without hesitation.

"Try and imagine that he's still alive. Begging for you. What are you going to do? Leave him there to suffer?"

The sudden thought of Cato, lying on a metal table, as the Capitol continuously tortured him for information that he didn't have was enough to almost make me cry. Burning and branding him. Wrapping barbed wire around his ankles and wrists. Shocking and electrocuting him. Drowning him and stopping just before he died. Feeding him little bits of rotten food with water dirty enough to give him all kinds of sicknesses. Setting some type of semi-lethal mutt on him. Each worse than the next.

"No," I said desperately.

"Then get up and save him," Brutus snarled.

Just a moment later the door flew open. Katniss walked in and looked in between Brutus and I. Her eyes narrowed. "Everything okay?" she asked curiously.

"Yes. Just wanted to see the Mockingjay in person. Not too impressive, I must say," Brutus said, glancing back at me. "But you can be. Think about it, kid. Dry your eyes." That was when I realized that I was crying. Again. As I seemed to always be doing these days. "Leaders of the rebellion don’t cry."

He was halfway to the door when I called him back. "Brutus? Thanks," I said softly.

"Don't get sentimental. I still hate you," Brutus said.

For whatever reason, it almost made me smile. "I know. I hate you, too," I said.

We exchanged something that might have been akin to a friendly gaze with each other. I didn't like Brutus and he didn't like me, but we understood each other. We were some of the few people in here that genuinely felt a real connection with Cato. Some of the few people that really loved him. There were the Hadley's, too, but I couldn't bring myself to speak with them. Not after what had happened to two of their children, because of me. For whatever reason, it was easier and more comfortable to talk to Brutus.

"What was that?" Katniss asked, sitting on the edge of my bed.

"Nothing," I answered.

She didn't need to know about that last conversation. She really hated Brutus, more than she had even hated Cato. From what I had heard, she apparently thought that Brutus was going to betray us. But even he had stepped in at one point and told her that he had no intentions of doing that. Not after what the Capitol had done to Cato. That hadn't stopped them from putting Brutus on lock down for a few weeks, following the breakout of the arena.

Katniss and I sat and ate our... breakfasts? I couldn't even figure out what time it was. To ensure that I was sleeping and not concerned about what hour of the day or night it was, the doctors had removed the clocks from my room. And all of the food in Thirteen tasted so similar. It was impossible to tell without those clocks that were mounted on the wall. We ate in silence for a long time and I leaned back against the bed frame and stared off into space.

If there was one good thing about having Brutus around, it was the fact that Brutus never spared my feelings. He told me everything that I needed to hear without worrying about how it would affect me. He was right about one thing. I needed to get off of my ass and save Cato. Even if he was already dead, I wanted to get his body back. Bury him back home in District 2. And if not, I had to save him. I had to get myself together and be the Mockingjay. For Cato.

"I'm sorry about the vase," I finally said, breaking the silence.

Katniss glanced over at me, obviously surprised by my words. "What?" Katniss asked. Finally she seemed to realize what I was talking about. "Aspen, that was weeks ago. You were upset and I was trying to push you. I shouldn’t have. I’m not upset about it. I never was."

"Still... I shouldn’t have thrown it," I said.

"It's alright," Katniss said.

She moved over and leaned back against the bed frame with me. "How did we get here, Katniss?" I asked softly.

"I don't know," she admitted.

"How did two words land us here?"

Those two stupid words that had escaped my mouth before I could think better of it. Just to save Katniss and Prim. "It would have happened sooner or later. You know that it would have," Katniss reasoned.

We all had known that it was coming sooner or later. "But it didn’t have to happen to me. To us. I just... I didn’t realize what something like this would do. I didn’t realize how awful it would be," I said.

"War isn’t pretty, Aspen. You knew that," Katniss said.

"I know." We sat in silence for a while a while longer. "Cat?" I called.

"Yeah?"

"Do you think he's still alive? Cato?"

"I don't know, Aspen. But there's one way to find out."

"What's that?"

"Do what they want. Get the Districts to join in the fight. We can move in on the Capitol once we're all banded together," Katniss explained. It was likely the plan that they had been forming over the past month. Unite the Districts, move in against the Capitol. "And once we're there, you can go and find him. If he's there, you'll have him back."

"Do you really think that I can do it?" I asked softly.

"I know that you can. You're the only person who can," Katniss said, pushing back the hair off of my forehead.

Cato's P.O.V.

Five Weeks Prior...

The Capitol. He had to be in the Capitol. Right? He remembered being in the hovercraft after Aspen had destroyed the arena. He remembered them telling him that she was dead. Then he had passed out. He had thought that he was dead. But then he had woken back up. Now he had been in the same room for... however long had passed. Cato Hadley wasn't sure. He had no idea how long it had been. He barely even knew who he was. He definitely knew that it didn't look like the Capitol.

He was lying in an all-white room. Blindingly white. He hated opening his eyes. He hated seeing the lights above his head, drilling into his eyes like needles. He knew that people had been bathing him. Keeping him relatively clean. The stiffness in his limbs told him that he had to have been out for at least three or four days. But the numbness in his mind told him that the drug-induced coma that they had placed him in hadn't passed. He just knew that he was in a hospital. He had no idea what was happening elsewhere.

Actually, that wasn't completely true. He had a vague idea that there had been some fighting around the Districts. He had to have been in the Capitol. Yes, that much I know. Because just the other day he was forced to sit down with Caesar Flickerman and give an interview. Just in case Aspen was alive. They wanted her to hear it. It wasn't scripted, but Cato knew exactly what he had to say. The Peacekeepers in the back of the room had made it obvious enough. Call for a ceasefire. He wasn't sure who had seen it.

The only thing that he knew for a fact was that Aspen was dead. No matter what the Capitol thought, Aspen was dead. That was the important thing. The only thing that mattered. He had never been so grateful that Aspen was dead. The thought that should have broken his heart only filled him with relief. He couldn't tolerate the thought that she would be in the clutches of the Capitol. Instead she was safe in her meadow. That was the only thing that mattered.

It would take him a long time to get over the idea that she was gone. Maybe the rest of his life. His very brutal, likely torturous, life. Some nights - or maybe it was the daytime - he would jerk awake and desperately search for her. He would moan her name, fighting back against the bonds to find out where she was. Then someone would stick him with some needle and he would eventually realize that she was dead. Sometimes he would cry, other times he would scream and fight back, and then there were the days that he would laugh happily, thrilled that she wasn't in their grasp.

Suddenly the door to the room was thrown open and two Peacekeepers arrived. They demanded that he came with them almost immediately. He didn't say anything or move without argument. Cato was given the black clothing in their hands and he slowly changed into them, shifting around with slow and deliberate movements. Once he was changed into the simple slacks and long-sleeved shirt, he walked with the Peacekeepers down countless hallways before stopping at a thick wooden door.

The Peacekeepers knocked on the door. "Come in!" an all-too-familiar voice called. The Peacekeepers opened the doors and Cato was pushed in. "Come in, my boy. I was just fending off some of your rabid fans now. Sit down." Cato did as told, seating himself across on the opposite couch from President Snow. "I called you here to thank you."

"Sir?" Cato asked, trying to remain impassive.

"For the success of your interview. You surpassed my wildest expectations," President Snow said.

"I was just saying how I felt," Cato said.

His voice was half-deadened. He had felt dead ever since the arena had blown. And he hadn't dared to talk about why he had only said what he had said because the Peacekeepers had been standing right there. Because he knew what would happen if he even got too close to saying what he really wanted to say. They had been relatively kind to him so far. What would they do if he tried to fight back? He would have to slowly make his way out and join the war efforts. Just the way that Aspen would have wanted.

"Which makes it all the more effective. You know the difference between reality and destructive adolescent fantasies. You were always the thoughtful one. Less impulsive than Aspen. Despite the fact that so many always believed you were the brash one. I always knew that it was her. If Panem follows her arrow into a civil war, we’ll witness something far worse than the Dark Days," President Snow explained.

"Aspen is dead," Cato said numbly.

"Perhaps. But her body was never found in the ruins of the arena. They haven't told you that. You can't know that. But, sooner or later, if the Mockingjay does indeed live, she won't hide forever," President Snow said.

That was something that genuinely shocked Cato. He had to fight to keep his face steady and not react. He thought that she was dead. They had told him that she was dead. But where was she? If she was dead, where was she? Obviously not a captive in the Capitol, like him. She might still be alive out there somewhere. But he couldn't react. He couldn't question it. He just had to pray that she might have really been alive out there and someone was keeping her safe.

In the meantime, he knew that he had to be careful while in the Capitol. It was no longer just about trying to wait out his own death. It was no longer about trying to join her in their meadow. Because she wasn't there. He wanted so desperately to believe that President Snow was telling the truth. She was alive. Somewhere. Who knew? But he could be with her again. One day. Until that day came, he had to protect her. No matter the personal cost. He just had to wait to be back with her.

"She never wanted a war," Cato said slowly.

"And there won't be one if Cato Hadley has anything to say about it," President Snow said.

Tread carefully. Keep Aspen safe. "I don't know what more there is to say. I'm sick of the blood. And from what I've seen, it's more on the hands of the Peacekeepers," Cato said.

President Snow smiled. "My boy. There might be a hundred things in a home that need to be fixed. But that doesn't justify burning it to the ground. We agree a war might end humanity. Keep saying that. It's the sincerity that comes so naturally to you. Mr. Hadley, sometimes in this world, whether we like it or not, we become symbols. And since I am a symbol of power and formality, like a seal on the door, which means I can't always reach into a living room. That has to come from a friend. From someone people feel that they might know. A blacksmith's son. The sooner these uprisings are put to rest... the sooner you'll see your home again," President Snow said.

Home... District 2... He'd almost forgotten about that. He had been so busy with his thoughts of Aspen. And he loved her. But he also loved his home. He missed his family. He wanted them to know that he was alive. One day he wanted to be back with them. He wanted to be with all of them. His family, Aspen, and hers. That was what they all deserved. And if he was careful enough, with his actions and words, that was exactly what was going to happen.

"So you're asking me to be what, sir? Your voice of reason?" Cato finally asked.

"You've understood everything but one, small, detail. I'm not asking," President Snow warned.

Aspen's P.O.V.

Present Day...

Later that day I was sitting on the bed in the hospital again. We hadn't moved from here in a long time. It was the only place that I felt even mildly comfortable. Katniss was still with me and now Prim was here, too. She was the one person that I had never lost my temper with. Because I knew she didn't deserve it. But we rarely spoke. Now I was laying in Prim's lap as she slowly brushed my hair. Which was good, since it was extremely tangled. We weren't speaking but Katniss was humming under her breath.

A moment later the door opened and we all straightened up. A dark-skinned man that appeared to be in his mid-forties was standing up against the wall. He was in an all-black uniform of a soldier. Different from the jumpsuits that everyone else wore. It meant that he was a soldier. I could also tell by his impeccable posture. He was bald and had deep brown eyes. He looked friendly enough but I still tensed up at the sight of him. Katniss positioned herself slightly in front of me as Prim grabbed my hand.

"Miss Antaeus. Or do you prefer to be called Hadley?" the man asked.

"Does anyone even care what I prefer to be called? As long as I'm the Mockingjay," I growled under my breath.

"Antaeus it is, then," the man decided. "Colonel Boggs, District Thirteen's head of security." I nodded blankly at him. "I know you've been discharged, but President Coin's requested to meet with you first."

President Coin... I'd heard her name mentioned but no one had actually forced the two of us to meet. I had assumed that they'd been giving us time. "I don't want to meet her," I sneered.

"It's an order, I'm sorry," Boggs said.

"No, you're not. None of you are," I said.

"You're right," Boggs said.

In a way, he reminded me of Brutus. But Boggs seemed at least a little friendlier. And I didn't know him. I did know Brutus. "You’re the first person that hasn’t been afraid to spare my feelings," I admitted.

"What good would that do?" Boggs said, not in a cruel way.

"What does she want that can't be delivered through you?" I asked.

"Come with me, please," Boggs requested.

"You should go, Aspen. Do you want me to come with you?" Katniss offered.

"Just Miss Antaeus. President Coin's orders," Boggs said.

Suddenly something occurred to me. If there was something about President Coin wanted, and she couldn't send someone to tell me,it might have been some news about the Capitol. It might have been news about the war. It might have been news about the other Districts uniting themselves. Obviously the Capitol hadn't won. Not if we were still alive. So had we made a big victory? Or, was it possible, that they had found Cato?

"Is there any news?" I asked, a mixture of fear and excitement in me.

"I'm just here to escort you," Boggs said.

Quickly I gave Katniss and Prim well-wishes. They both wished me luck with a promise that they would speak to me later, if I needed it. Which I had a feeling would likely happen. But I would manage. Prim gave me a small hug and Katniss patted me on the shoulder. They were both worried about my well-being. As they likely always would be. I quickly changed from the hospital robe that I had been in for so long and slipped on one of the jumpsuits for the first time.

It had been so long since I had worn actual clothing. It almost reminded me of the way that I was dressed for the Seventy-Fifth Games. My hands started to shake but I forced myself to remain steady as Boggs led me out of the hospital room. So we walked out together. For a while I didn't speak. And neither did Boggs. I had been here for a little over a month - as far as I could tell - but they hadn't actually let me walk around. I would only run off to the boiler room during my nightmares.

Even after being in District 13 for just over a month, I still had yet to meet President Coin. I had only heard a little bit about her. Evidently she was stern and strict about the rules, but everyone understood that she was a good leader who cared for her people. I wasn't sure that I cared about how she ruled. I just cared that she had never come to our aid. And I had a feeling that she'd had no desire to meet me unless I agreed to be the Mockingjay. I didn't know who had convinced her to meet me now.

Currently we were in an elevator and heading down. Down and down and down. Even further underground than we already were. Everything in District 13 was dark and lit up with these horrible bright white lights. The same ones in the hospital. Everything looked much older than it did in the Capitol, but it was much more impressive than District 12. But I didn't like being down here. It felt a little strange. I liked being up in the air in the trees. Not suffocating under the dirt.

"We were always told there was nothing left of Thirteen," I commented.

"Capitol bombed the surface to rubble. But we're military, so we learned to survive down here. Preparing, training," Boggs explained.

"You were born here, then?" I asked.

This whole time, there were people here. Just waiting to fight. "Yes. Born and raised. To know everything that happened in the Dark Days and the rebellion and the Hunger Games," Boggs explained.

"But never offer any help to the Districts," I sneered.

"We just had to wait for our opportunity. We're here now," Boggs said.

"You're seventy-five years too late."

"Maybe not. The war never stopped for us."

"It never stopped for us either. Just ask the one thousand seven hundred and thirty-one families who have lost their children to the Hunger Games," I sneered under my breath.

That was when I noticed something in Boggs' eyes. Something that looked a little strange to me. Something that I hadn't seen much of since arriving to District 13. Understanding. Everyone felt guilty for not saving Cato. But no one truly understood. Boggs didn't look very happy about my last comment. But he said nothing as the elevator opened and we were let out into the hallway. Immediately I noticed that everyone was staring at me as we walked. Probably because they hadn't seen me yet.

There was a lot of muttering from the crowd out in District 13. As much as they had seen from me on their televisions, none of them had seen me in reality. And there was also the problem that they had known that I was here in Thirteen. But none of them had known when they would actually get a chance to see me. Plus they all thought that I was recovering from a miscarriage. Which apparently took time. Up to a month. They should have been expecting to see me anyways.

Eventually we turned down a corridor that very few people were standing in. I was grateful for the loss of whispering. And the loss of those horrible faces. The ones who felt so guilty. At the loss of my husband and unborn baby. We ultimately entered something that looked like a war planning room. Plutarch, Beetee, and a woman that I assumed to be President Coin were in the room. Beetee was now in a wheelchair that was pressed up against the table.

Slowly my gaze turned back over to President Coin. She was the only person here that I had never met. And, up until now, had seemed to have no interest in meeting me. She was wearing a very covering gray suit that buttoned up to her throat. Her hair was gray and pin straight, ending at exactly the same length just below her shoulders. There were two strips in the front of her hair that were almost white. And her eyes were almost a bright yellow. She looked to be in her fifties.

Plutarch led Coin over to where Boggs and I were standing. She had an eerily similar appearance to Snow. At least, I thought she did. "There she is. Our Girl on Fire," Plutarch said, smiling.

"Don't call me that," I snarled.

"Would you prefer Mockingjay?" Plutarch asked.

"I would prefer if you had left me in that arena to die," I said bluntly.

As much as I would have loved to try and pull myself together, I was still angry and heartbroken. "Some of the Morphling may still be in her system," Plutarch told Coin softly. "Madam President, may I present you with the Mockingjay."

"What an honor it is to meet you," Coin said, walking forward.

She grabbed my hand and shook it gently. "Is that so?" I asked.

"Of course," Coin said, surprised.

"Aspen, just hear her out. Please," Beetee said, speaking to me for the first time in weeks.

I glanced down at Beetee before looking back up at Coin. "You're a courageous young woman. I know how disorienting this must be. And I can't imagine what it's like to live through the atrocities of those Games," she said.

"No. You can't," I said, speaking before I could think better of it. "Because you’ve never had to live through them. You’ve never had to watch your children be sent off to die. Never known to start counting your days. Never even stepped in to help."

If she was offended by my words, she didn't make it obvious. She turned back towards Plutarch and smiled. "And you said that she wasn’t a good public speaker," she told him. I scowled at them both as Coin turned back to me. "We had reasons for sitting back and waiting for the opportune moment."

"If only we'd all had that luxury. Time," I said.

Now Plutarch was scowling at me. "Okay, why don’t you go back to your stony silence?" he suggested gently. I shrugged my shoulders. "Aspen, President Alma Coin."

Not that I hadn't figured that out by now. "Please know how welcome you are," Coin said, reaching out to place a hand on my arm.

"Don't touch me," I snapped, jerking away from her.

"My apologies," Coin said, placing her hands back in front of her, not looking offended at my bark. "I understand that you need time. I hope you'll find some comfort with us. We've known loss in Thirteen, too."

"This is history. Right here at this table," Beetee said.

For a moment I turned down to look at him. "I apologize. I wish you had more time to recover, but unfortunately, we don't have that luxury," Coin said, drawing my attention back to her. "Please, have a seat."

"A month is plenty," Plutarch said.

"Theoretically, Aspen should have been given at least two or three months to recuperate," Beetee said.

Recovering in what way? Was he still playing at the pregnancy card? Did Coin know the truth? Maybe. Maybe not. I doubted she would say anything about it either way. Maybe he was talking about the electrical shock, which I had a feeling the effects had long since passed. Or maybe he was talking about the concussion. I knew that much was still lingering. The doctors had told me that much. Slowly I took a seat next to Coin, with Beetee on one side and Plutarch sitting on Coin's other side.

"Are you aware of what's happened?" Coin asked.

"They've told me. I try not to listen," I admitted.

"When you fired your arrow at the force field you electrified the nation. There have been riots and uprisings and strikes in seven Districts. We believe that if we keep this energy going we can unify the Districts against the Capitol. But if we don't, if we let it dissipate, we could be waiting another seventy-five years for this opportunity," Coin said, trying to press the gravity of the situation.

But that didn't stop my mouth from getting the best of me. "So that's why you waited so long. To let someone else do the hard work?" I offered nastily.

"Everyone in Thirteen is ready for this," Coin said, ignoring my last comment.

"What about Cato? Is he alive?" I asked Plutarch, ignoring Coin.

Plutarch shook his head, having the decency to at least look sorry. "I don't know. And I wish that I did. But there's no way for me to contact my operatives inside the Capitol," Plutarch admitted.

"Find one. Tell me that he's alive and I'll fight," I said honestly.

That was a surefire way to get me to fight. In the meantime, I was so angry about everything that had happened. I was so angry with them and I couldn't get over it. "We can't. We need you to take our word for it that we'll do everything that we can for him if he's still alive," Plutarch promised.

"Like you did in the arena?" I snarled.

Obviously they were not happy with my words and refusal to cooperate. "The Capitol has always suppressed communication between the Districts. But I know their system very well. I managed to break through," Beetee said, trying a different tactic.

But that didn't make sense. "What does that mean?" I asked dumbly.

"All we need now is the perfect message," Beetee said.

"Aspen, here's what we need to do," Plutarch said. "We need to show them that the Mockingjay's alive and well -"

"Well..." I said, laughing humorlessly.

"- and willing to stand up and join this fight," Plutarch continued, ignoring my little quip. "'Cause we need every District to stand up to this Capitol. The way you did. So we're gonna shoot a series of propaganda clips, propos, I like to call them, on the Mockingjay. Spreads the word that we're gonna stoke the fire of this rebellion. The fire that the Mockingjay started."

"I meant to be a martyr. To die in that arena. The way that Haymitch promised me I would," I said stubbornly. A moment later I saw a figure move out from the shadows and I turned back to see that Seneca Crane was walking out and towards the table. "The way that you promised me that I would."

These days, Seneca was, surprisingly enough, the person that was trying the hardest to help me. "I tried to help him out of there. But it was always about something bigger than that. It was always about getting you out," Seneca whispered, looking guilty.

"Not me," I snarled, earning confused looks from across the table. "Not Aspen Antaeus. The Mockingjay. If it had been Johanna, you would have let me die to get her out of there. You don’t care about me. Just what they call me."

"You're right," Plutarch said, surprising me. I hadn't thought that he would actually agree with me. "But we need you. The Districts need you. You have more right than anyone else to hate the Capitol. Help us finish them off, once and for all."

"Do it yourself. As you've obviously been managing for so long," I snarled.

"It was all underground. Until you. Until you became the face of the rebellion. Until people saw someone that could stand up and fight back. Someone just like you. A simple girl from District 12. Someone to follow. Because if she could do it, so could they," Plutarch said, trying to be encouraging.

But the anger was back. A radiating fury. "You left him there," I snarled, leaning into Plutarch. "You left Cato in that arena -"

"Aspen -" Plutarch started.

"- to die," I finished.

"There are so many -" Plutarch started again.

But I cut him off by slamming my hand down on the table, making everyone jump slightly. "Cato was the one who was supposed to live!" I shouted loudly.

"Miss Antaeus," Coin said loudly, distracting me from what was sure to be a marvelous temper tantrum. "This revolution is about everyone. It's about all of us. And we need a voice."

"Then you should've saved Cato," I snarled at her, rising to my feet.

"Aspen -" Seneca started.

I whirled around so fast that I practically flew off of my feet from the remnants of the concussion. "I'm done being a piece in everyone's games. Yours, theirs; it's no different. You use people and then dispose of them. Find a new Mockingjay. It won’t be that hard. In the meantime, leave me alone. Let me die," I snarled.

"Cato wouldn't want that," Seneca said gently.

Another humorless laugh escaped my mouth. "Since when did you care what Cato wanted? Since you brought me in your bed and threatened those two little girls?" I asked, earning a surprised look from both Coin and Beetee. Seneca's face flushed. "One of them is dead. Did you know that?"

"Yes," Seneca said regretfully. "And I was very sorry to hear that."

"Don't ever call me back in here. Not unless you get him back," I told them all.

Without giving them a chance to say anything else, I turned back and stormed out of the room. There was nothing that I wanted from them. The only thing that I wanted that they could give me was Cato. Unless they got him back, I wanted them far away from me. To my surprise, I didn't leave the room alone. Boggs followed me. I had thought that he would stay with Coin, being her second-in-command. But clearly he was here for me.

Turning back just for a moment, I realized that there was a strange look on his face. My fists were clenched at my sides as angry tears began to run down my face. More crying that I was powerless to stop. Boggs fell into step at my side. It was obvious enough by looking at Boggs that he wasn't used to seeing displays of emotion like I just had. Particularly in a place with so many cold and hardened soldiers. It was very obvious that he wasn't used to people like me.

"You genuinely loved him," Boggs said softly.

"Love," I corrected quickly. "He’s gone, but it isn't."

"We see everything here in Thirteen. During the Games." I nodded absentmindedly. "I remember, in the Seventy-Fourth, when people questioned if it was genuinely an act or if it was real," Boggs said.

My head snapped over towards him. It was the same thing that President Snow had once told me. How people had questioned if love was my motive for what I had done or if it had been an act of defiance, hidden by love. The truth was that I was in love with Cato the whole time. But that didn't mean that all of my actions had been for love. Some of them had been just to show the Capitol that they couldn't control me. But there had always been love there.

Where had it started? That was the question that I used to think about each time that Katniss would try and act interested in my love life. She would ask me when I had really felt it. For the first time, when I had known that something was there. When I had known that it wasn't just a flirtation and wasn't just me trying to get it out of my system before I died. It had taken me a long time, but I had figured it out. And the entire world had watched it happen. We had been talking about him killing Clove at some point.

"How can you do that?" I asked.

"Don't think. Just kill," Cato said.

"That's what I tell myself when I hunt."

"Tributes?"

"Animals. I guess there's not much of a difference."

"No. There is. They teach us that killing isn't so bad. But I remember what my mother once told me. When I first told him that I wanted to come into the Games. She was proud of me but she said, 'Remember something. To murder an innocent person will change you. You'll never be the same. And there will be one person that haunts you forever.' I ignored her at the time. Now I can't."

What had followed was the first kiss that I had initiated. I remembered feeling that little flip of my heart. I remembered feeling that he was the kind of person that I had never thought that I would meet. I remembered feeling just how horrible it was that we only had so little time to spend to each other. I remembered wishing that we hadn't pulled apart. The real kiss that had genuinely dazed me was in the cave on my birthday, but that was where it had genuinely started. Me falling so desperately in love with him.

"It was real. Every part of it," I said softly.

"I didn’t know that at the time. I know it now," Boggs said, somewhat reassuringly.

"Now is too late," I muttered.

In the War Room...

Everyone was frustrated with Aspen Antaeus. But the question always came. How for could they go when it came to her? What could they say to her that wouldn't seem insensitive? They all felt badly over what had happened between Aspen and Cato. They all knew that she would be hard to get on board once they lost the boy. But they had been hoping by now that she would get over it. Although it became obvious very quickly that she wasn't going to work with them anytime soon.

"Maybe you should have rescued the boy instead," Coin suggested to Plutarch.

"Oh, no. No, no, listen to me. No one else can do this but her. And the boy... Remember that just a year ago he was a Career Tribute from District 2. Careers are universally hated by all those in the other Districts. The Districts who make up the majority of the rebels. Things have gotten better concerning him with the way he's fallen in love with Aspen, but it has to be her," Plutarch reassured the leader of District 13.

"She can't do it," Coin said.

Seneca Crane stepped forward, having a sudden urge to protect Aspen. Just as he had for a long time now. "Aspen is capable of much. She just has to be reminded of what she's capable of," Seneca said.

Coin stared at him for a moment before shifting her gaze to Plutarch. "This is not the girl you described," Coin pointed out.

"You heard the way that she was speaking. That girl, the girl who became the Mockingjay through her own actions, so accidentally, is still there," Plutarch said. Coin stared at him, unconvinced. Maybe she once had been. But not anymore. "We just have to find her. Remind her of who she is."

"She wants to die," Coin said.

"She wants to die because she thinks that Cato is dead. It would help to remind her that Cato wanted her to be brave," Seneca said, only all-too-aware of how much Aspen genuinely had, and still did, love Cato Hadley. "To end the reign of the Capitol."

If she had even managed to change Seneca's ideals about the Games and the Capitol, she could easily to do it to the rest of the people in the Districts. And, if they were brave enough, maybe even some people in the Capitol would start siding with her. It was the fact that she had managed to change him, show him just how cruel the Games and everything that came with them were, that was the reason that Seneca was fighting so hard against the Capitol now. Everything was for her. The rebellion always would be.

"She can't do that. She's changed," Coin said.

"Well obviously, we need to make it personal. Remind her who the real enemy is," Plutarch said, an idea forming in his mind.

"She knows who the enemy is, that's not the issue," Coin said.

"Unless she's forgotten. There’s explaining and there's showing. Let her see the footage that the Capitol sent out. The broadcast," Plutarch said, surprising the other two in the room.

If there was one thing that would hurt Aspen more than everything already had, it was showing her that. "That's cruel. To show her that," Seneca said.

"That's war," Plutarch said regretfully.

"She can’t see that. It would only make things worse," Seneca said determinedly.

"Seneca is correct. She can't handle it. The Games destroyed her," Coin said.

The Games hadn't destroyed her permanently. Seneca knew that. But that footage might. "This is the only choice you have. People don't always show up the way you want them to, Madam President. But that anger, that anger-driven defiance, that's what we want. And we can redirect it. We need to unite these people out there that have been doing nothing but killing each other in an arena for years. We have to have a lightning rod. They’ll follow her. She’s the face of the revolution. Let her see it," Plutarch said.

"She can't see that," Seneca said determinedly.

Coin turned to him in surprise. "You genuinely do care for her," she said slowly.

"Yes. I do," Seneca admitted, wishing that he hadn't done everything to Aspen that he had. Because she would never know how deeply he did care for her. "Don't show her that footage."

Coin turned back to Plutarch. "You genuinely think that this will work?" she asked.

"I think that it will at least motivate her to do something," Plutarch said.

"Do it," Coin demanded Beetee.

Aspen's P.O.V.

A long time had passed. Or maybe it hadn't. It felt like hours had passed. Of course, with no clock on the wall it became hard to tell just how much time had passed. All I knew was that I was back in my hospital room, alone. It had taken me a long time to convince Boggs that I wasn't going to off myself while he wasn't paying attention. Honestly I wasn't really sure that I wanted to die. Because I knew that it was selfish. Because I knew that Cato wouldn't have wanted me to do that. He would want me to fight.

In the back of my mind I knew that I should have gotten up and done something. Anything. The people had seen me. They knew that I was awake and physically recovered. I should have gone and walked around District 13. Seen what it had to offer. But I didn't want to leave and find my new room assignment. Because I got the sleeping medicine when I was in here. It made the nightmares worse sometimes, but at least it knocked me out right away. I wouldn't get it if I left and went to the barracks.

And I didn't want to scare Prim was my deafening screams. Even though I knew that I wouldn't. She wasn't that weak little girl from just over a year ago. She would be at school right now and volunteering in the hospital later. She always seemed to be busy with them. Ms. Everdeen was always working in the hospital. I had absolutely no desire to see the Hadley family. Right now, at least. Katniss was at work right now. She hadn't told me what she did yet. Something about training.

It was obvious that she was hoping to be out on the front lines of the war efforts. I knew that she could do it. She was a fantastic shot and had the fire under her veins that we needed. She would have made a good Mockingjay. Not me. All I knew was that she was ready to get out there and fight. It was something that I wished that I could do. I wished that I could motivate myself to get up and pick up a weapon again. And I would... I believed that. In time.

Suddenly the door was thrown open. I jumped slightly, fearing that it was the doctors for another psychological profile. But it was only Gale. He walked in and seated himself at the edge of my bed. I waited for him to speak but he said nothing. And I said nothing. There was nothing that I could think to say to him right now. He dropped by sometimes but we never spoke. Barely even looked at each other. We hadn't actually spoken since the day that he told me that District 12 was gone.

As much as I knew that I should have been grateful that he still wanted to be around me, after everything that I had put him through over the past year and a half, I found myself irritable that he was here. Not really because he was here. But just because I wanted to be left alone for a while. But they didn't like leaving me alone. They thought that I would kill myself. But I just wanted to think about Brutus and Katniss' words. I wanted to be the Mockingjay. But I couldn't. I also really wanted to hit someone.

My hands were shaking again. "You might want to take a few steps back," I warned.

"Why?" Gale asked, finally looking at me.

He turned towards me as I curled my knees up to my chest. "Because I have the overwhelming urge to hit you. And I think that if I do hit you, I won't stop," I said honestly. Gale looked unaffected. "And I know you well enough to know that you won't hit back."

"You'd have every right," Gale said, well aware of how angry I was that he had hidden the truth.

"I know," I said.

"I'm sorry, Aspen. I really am," Gale muttered.

An irrational anger shot through me. I sat upright, practically placing myself nose-to-nose with Gale. "You know, I am so sick of hearing people tell me how sorry they are. Everyone is sorry. Everyone wishes that it had happened differently. But it didn't. It happened like this. And no one really cares. The only thing that they care about is that their Mockingjay won’t help. So they say sorry, thinking that it might change something," I snarled, finally admitting how I felt.

Gale reached out for my hand. I tried to yank myself back but his grip on me tightened. He wouldn't let me pull away anymore than I already had. "You can change things," Gale said determinedly.

"If you tell me to be the Mockingjay, I'll scream. And then I will hit you. And then I'll break something. And I won't stop. I want to break something. I want to rip everyone to pieces. I don't know if I'm angry, or heartbroken, or just actually broken. But this is a feeling that I wouldn't wish on anyone," I said, my voice cracking.

"It's helplessness," Gale said softly.

"Oh, no. It is so much more than that," I answered.

Honestly I wasn't even sure what it was. But it was utter misery. The two of us sat in an awkward silence for a while. Gale had never been the best speaker and I had never been very level-headed. It was bad enough that things had been very tense between the two of us for the past few weeks. It was bad enough that we had barely spoken. Mostly because I was still angry about everything that had happened. Gale was my best friend, he knew, and he still hadn't told me.

"You'll be pleased to know that Buttercup isn't here," Gale said, finally breaking the long silence.

"So I noticed. They don't seem to like animals too much here," I said.

Prim must have hated not having Buttercup here. "They're against the rules," Gale said.

The two of us looked over at each other and just stared. The way that we always had. Looking at each other, reading our faces, looking for the hints of hidden emotion. After a minute I leaned in and hugged Gale. I was sick of being so angry with him. He tensed up for a moment before relaxing and letting me lean into his arms. Just as I had so many times before. He pressed his cheek against the top of my head as I finally relaxed into his arms. The first time that I had been relaxed in weeks.

"It's been a long time since you actually hugged me," Gale muttered into my hair.

"I know."

"Didn't think you'd ever do it again."

"Me either," I admitted.

We stayed together for a few more moments before Gale gently pushed me off. We kept our hands linked. "You know, Cato brought me off to the side the day of your wedding," Gale said.

That was news to me. "Did he?" I asked.

"Yeah. He asked me to keep an eye on you after he was gone. He asked me to take care of you," Gale said. Bile built up in my throat. I knew Cato well enough to know where that conversation had gone. "And he asked me to... help you move on. When the time was right."

Even from beyond the grave, Cato was still pushing me towards Gale. I could almost laugh. "He told me the same thing. A number of times before... everything," I said awkwardly.

This wasn't a conversation I was prepared for yet. "I won't push you. But I'm here. Whenever you need me," Gale said.

Good. I couldn't deal with more of those conversations. Not right now. "Thanks. I’m sorry about everything, Gale. Everything from the moment that I went into the arena last year," I said, seeing as there wasn't enough time to apologize for everything.

"Don’t apologize, Aspen. It was my fault. I shouldn't have kept pushing you. I knew that you were in love with him and I was just angry about it. So I took it out on you," Gale admitted.

"And I pushed too hard for you to get to know him. We both did things wrong," I said, owning up to my own mistakes.

Gale gave a gentle shrug, letting me know that he didn't mind my previous attitude. "I guess we did. I'm going to keep my promise to him. The only promise that I ever made to him. I'll protect you, Aspen. I'm going to watch out for you. Whenever you need me, however you need me, I'll be here. You just let me know," Gale promised.

As in, friend right now, lover one day, husband eventually, and maybe even the father to my real children. The exact promise that Cato had made Gale keep. The promise that I hadn't had time to make Skye or Julie keep. Not that it mattered. It was too late now. And right now I couldn't even think about something like that. It would take time. Maybe forever. But that was Gale. He would wait for me forever. Even if he would never be what Cato was to me. Guilt wracked through me. For both Cato and Gale.

"Right now I just need you to be my best friend. Help me through this," I begged.

Gale wrapped an arm around my shoulder. "Always, Aspen," he promised, the same promise that Cato had given me so many times before. "This is the first time that you haven't looked heartbroken in a long time."

"I still am. But I'm trying to figure things out. Trying to figure out if I have what it takes to be the Mockingjay," I muttered.

"You do," Gale said.

"Maybe. But I didn't want it."

"No one ever wants what they get when it comes to things like this. They just get what gets thrown at them."

"Katniss thinks that I can do it."

"We agree on that matter."

Slowly I turned to face him. "Really?" I asked.

Gale smiled and pushed the hair back out of my face. "Really. You're tough, Aspen. I know that you are. And if there's one thing that you can do for Cato... It's ending this. The Capitol's reign. The Hunger Games. All of it. Once and for all. And we need the Mockingjay to do that," Gale said, using the one argument in his arsenal that could motivate me.

Cato... What he wanted me to do. But... "No one ever asked what I needed," I said, my voice breaking.

Pain flashed behind Gale's eyes. "I care about what you need. What do you need?" he asked.

"That's a long list."

"What’s something that I can do for you? Right now," Gale said.

Bring my husband back. "Just stay with me," I whispered.

"Always," Gale promised.

It was the same thing that Cato had told me so many times before. Maybe that was why it had always been so hard for me to let go of Gale. Because he reminded me so much of Cato. I sniffled softly as Gale laid back and allowed me to curl into the crook of his shoulder. The tears started a moment later. Gale wrapped an arm around my shoulder. My rock, as he always had been. Slowly I started to sob into him. I missed Cato more than I had ever thought was possible. His loss was slowly killing me.

"I hate this. I never used to cry," I said, through an annoyingly tearful voice. "Now I can't stop. Even when Mr. Everdeen died, I didn't cry. They were these horrible dry sobs, but I didn't cry. Over the past year... I've cried a lot more than I care to admit."

Gale pressed a small kiss against my forehead. "Doesn't make you weak. You're the strongest person that I know. Who else could have survived everything that you did?" Gale offered.

"Not even me, Gale. I'm alive. But I'm not living," I admitted.

"We're going to fix that. I promise."

How? But I didn't ask that because I knew that he wouldn't have an answer. We laid together in silence before something dawned on me. "Did you come here for something?" I asked.

"Just to see how you were doing. I wanted to make sure that you were okay," Gale said.

"Well... you've seen," I muttered.

The two of us sat together for a long while after that. I didn't know how long it had been but I didn't care. For once, I didn't want that clock in the room. I wanted to just enjoy the peace that I felt being with Gale. It wasn't quite like being with Cato, but it was some form of comfort. As I laid in his shoulders I managed to drift off. Only for a few minutes though, before I had been roused by another nightmare. But finally someone had been there to calm me down.

Gale hadn't seen many of the nightmare-driven panics that I usually woke up in. He was clearly startled by my movements but he managed to calm himself down before reassuring me that everything was okay. Which it wasn't, but I appreciated the lie. I stayed awake afterwards, just lying on his arm. We only exchanged a few comments from time to time but I was glad to have him around me. A while later Gale glanced down at his watch and slowly pried himself away from me. It was his time to go to training.

After placing a small kiss against my forehead, he turned and got ready to leave. One of these days I would have to force myself to get off of my ass and go to training. He promised that he would come back and see me soon. I knew that some meal was coming up soon. I could tell by the way that the doctors were moving around. But I didn't eat in the dining room. I always ate in the hospital wing by myself. It was the only way that I could suffer through eating. Horrified, wondering if Cato was being starved.

That was why I wanted to be alone. Just in case I was hit with a panic attack. For a while it had also been so that I wouldn't have to eat anything. But now I was determined to eat something. Just to try and build up my strength again. I wanted to try and go out there to see what was happening. So I could go out there and try to be the Mockingjay. I would give it a try first. Before diving in headfirst. Because I knew that they were all right, as much as I hated to admit it.

If there was any chance that Cato was still alive, there was only one thing that I could do that could possibly save him. I had to go and become the Mockingjay. That was the only thing that would help him at this point. The rebels would advance on the Capitol once I could manage to join the Districts. I could manage it. I knew that I could. I genuinely believed that. Because I had done it when I'd blown up the arena. I could do whatever I needed to do. If it meant that he would live.

At that point I could even try breaking into the center of the Capitol. There was a chance that I could get into the palace. It wouldn't be easy. But I could give my own life to do it. I could get in and rescue Cato. There was a chance that it might not work, but I had to try. I had to try to save Cato. There was a good likelihood that he wasn't even alive, and it was probably better that he wasn't, but I was so desperate to save him. As I always had been.

The door hissed open and I glanced up to see Katniss walk into the room. "Get some sleep?" she asked, looking at the rumpled sheets.

"Let's go out to the dining room," I said, standing from the bed.

"Really?" Katniss asked, surprised.

"Yeah. I want to get out of here," I said.

"Okay. Come on," Katniss said.

It was the happiest that I had seen her looking in a long time. Because she knew that I was finally ready to try. The two of us headed out of the hospital together. Katniss was standing very close to me. Even though I had been discharged more than once, I hadn't been able to bring myself to leave. The first time that I had left the hospital was earlier today when Boggs had brought me to the War Room. We headed out and down some hallway that I had never been down before.

Suddenly I realized that I had never bothered to look around District 13. Never when I was walking back and forth, trying to hide from my nightmares. I hadn't even looked that much when I had headed into the elevator with Boggs. Now I noticed that it looked very tense. The air was thick and the lights were dark. There were only the florescent lights that provided any way to really see each other. Everyone looked exactly the same. Everything was made out of metal. Nothing natural. Not like District 12 had been.

About halfway to the dining room, Boggs met up with us. He didn't say anything, even as I looked over at him, but he fell into step with me. We were about to enter what appeared to be the dining room when I realized that people were lined up. They were placing their arms underneath some type of scanner. One at a time, not looking in pain or mildly interested in what was happening. It looked like they were getting something tattooed on them. Almost like in the Capitol. But these were lines. My brow raised.

"What is that?" I asked softly.

"Every morning they get a temporary tattoo on the underside of their arm that shows their daily schedule. It shows where to be and what activities are to be performed at specific times. Meals are scheduled regularly every day, while others might vary significantly. Eventually the ink breaks down and gets washed off in preparation for the next day," Katniss explained.

"Controlling," I muttered.

"Yeah. It is," Katniss agreed.

"You sound like a robot," I said, referring to her explanation.

"So do you," Katniss shot back.

That was when I realized what she had just said. "Is it morning?" I asked.

It felt like it should have been at least mid-afternoon. "Yeah. You woke up in the middle of the night and have been awake since then," Katniss said. I nodded at her and groaned a second later, placing my hands against my temple. A searing pain from the site of impact from the coil. "You okay?"

The concern was clear in her voice. "Headache," I answered.

"Want to go back and get some more medicine?" Katniss offered.

"No."

It was time for me to wean myself off of the medicine. It wouldn't be fun, but I needed to do it. I needed to get off of my ass and do something. Together we headed into the dining hall. I hadn't stood this much in weeks. Probably the exact reason that the headache was coming on. There were a number of people who were sitting around the tables. They were all staring at me and muttering but I ignored them. I didn't want to hear what they were saying. I didn't want any of them looking at me.

"Do you want to sit with someone?" Katniss asked.

"No. Just us. Where's Gale?" I asked, looking around.

"I'm not sure. Come on. Let's see if we can find him," Katniss said.

They were the only three people that I wanted to sit with right now. Except Prim, who was working. As the two of us wound in and out of the tables, there was a loud shriek and everyone turned up to see that there was a message on the screen. But it wasn't from District 13. It had the Capitol seal. Katniss and I had just seated ourselves. But the moment that I saw the Capitol seal I stood up from the table and moved in front of the screen. People were muttering as President Snow took the screen.

"A reminder to the rebels… of the fate of all those who support the Mockingjay," President Snow said.

"What is this?" I asked Katniss weakly.

"I don't know," Katniss said.

"Do they know that I'm alive?" I asked.

"I don't think so. I think that they're just guessing," Katniss said.

"Hey. It's okay," Gale said, appearing at my side.

The two of them had their arms around me. This was a message for me. I was smart enough to know that. Which meant that this was likely going to be one thing. Someone was suddenly thrown down into the screen. I stilled for a moment, letting out a strangled sob, fearing that it was Cato. But the dark skin tone, black shirt, and familiar figure told me that it wasn't. It was someone whom I had thought was already dead the last time that I had seen them.

"Cinna!" I shouted.

Some of the people who had been watching the screen in horror whipped back to stare at me. Now there was even more pity in their eyes. Because everyone knew just how much I cared about Cinna. How much I loved him. How much I had been convinced that he was already dead. I lunged at the screen, although there was no reason to do that. But I couldn't just stand here and do nothing. Gale caught me around the waist and kept me pressed against him.

"It's okay. It's okay. You can't get to him. It's a recording. This has already happened, Aspen," Gale said.

"Cinna..." I begged.

"Look away, Aspen. Don't watch it," Katniss whispered.

Gale had me pulled flush against his chest as Katniss stood at my back, brushing back my hair. I knew that they were right. I knew that I shouldn't have been watching this. I knew that it was the wrong thing to do. But I couldn't stop myself. I had to see the last few moments of his life. I watched as Peacekeepers with studded gloves hit Cinna progressively harder and harder, just as they did when I was in the tube before the Games. I was so convinced that he was already dead.

It went on and on as they hit him. His skull looked like it might have been dented in some places. They had broken it. Many of his bones looked broken, too. It was brutal. The entire thing was brutal beyond belief. Because I loved Cinna. Gale was right. This had already happened. That was the first thing that I realized. Snow was just sending it out so that I could watch. He must have figured that I was alive. This was just to show me how powerful and in control he was.

Hours must have passed. There was no way that it had only been a few minutes or a few seconds. This was going on for ages. It never seemed to end. Katniss and Gale tried to pull me away from the screen, as did some others, but I refused to leave. I was gasping as Cinna progressively looked worse and worse. He said nothing back to the Peacekeepers and never tried to fight them. It was something that chilled me to the bone. I wished that he would fight back against them.

Finally it ended. They pulled away from him. Were they going to let Cinna live? Even as an Avox. As anything. Just like I had thought that they might have done with Cato. That was better than nothing. But that wasn't what happened. Just a moment later a Peacekeeper raised a gun to his head. I was about to scream. They were finally going to execute him. And they were showing it for the entirety of Panem to see. And hoping that I would see it, if I was indeed still alive.

"No!" I screamed.

"Look away. Now," Gale demanded.

But I couldn't break my gaze from the screen. I couldn't look away from Cinna. The man who had always been so strong for me. Gale wouldn't let me watch it, though. He grabbed my head and forced me to tuck it down into his shoulder. Just a second later a shot echoed through District 13. And my head. I jumped harshly at the sudden noise. That was when the truth of what had just happened hit me. Cinna was dead. Now I knew that Cinna was dead. Because of what he did for me.

"You will pay the ultimate price," Snow's voice ended the transmission.

Then the screen went blank. "Aspen? Aspen?" Katniss called. I ignored her, staring blankly at the screen. "Are you okay?"

"Tiger? Come on. We should get you back to bed," Gale begged.

They were both pulling gently on my shoulders. They wanted me away from where I had just seen Cinna die. But I couldn't leave. Because I had just had a sudden thought. There was something that I now knew that I needed to do. I needed to take the first step. I had to do something right now. Anything that Cato would have wanted me to do. He would have wanted me to fight back. And I would. But there was something that I had to do first. There was something that I had to see.

"Where are you going?" Katniss called.

"The War Room," I said.

"Why?" Katniss asked.

"I need them to do something," I said.

"Hang on! Aspen!" Katniss shouted.

She was trying to chase me down but Gale pulled her back. I heard him saying something along the lines of letting me do what I had to do. Because he knew the truth. He knew that I was about to take the first step towards becoming the Mockingjay. I ignored Katniss's final call and stalked off. Quickly I pushed through the crowd, ignoring people asking me if I was okay and the doctors, who were pleading with me to stop. Finally I arrived at the War Room, ignoring the pleas from the guards outside, and entered.

Plutarch, Seneca, and Coin were still in there. It looked like they had been talking with each other before I had entered. "I thought that you said that you were never coming back," Plutarch said, staring at me.

"I said to never call me back," I corrected.

"So why are you here?" Plutarch asked.

"I want to go home," I said.

The two of them exchanged a quick look. Plutarch raised a brow and nodded while Coin shook her head and looked back at me. "I'm afraid that sending you back to District 12 is impossible. You would not be safe living there. You have to remain here," Coin said reproachfully.

"You misunderstand me. I don't want to go back permanently. I just want to go out there for the day. I want to see what Snow did to my home," I explained.

But that didn't change anything. "No. It's not safe," Coin said.

"Let me rephrase that," I said, raising my voice and giving it a dangerous edge. "I have to go. You will make it work."

They exchanged a look again. Now Plutarch and Seneca were smiling. Coin still didn't look happy. "Going home is too dangerous. The Capitol will likely think that you will go there if you are still alive. They'll be waiting for you," Coin said.

"So clear it out. Then send me there," I demanded sharply. "I need to see it."

"You have no idea what you'll be walking into," Coin said.

But I did. Thousands upon thousands of my people dead. The town reduced to ashes. But I just had to see it. I had to see what he had done. "No. I know exactly what I’ll be walking into. But I have to see it. If you want me to be the Mockingjay... You have to let me do this. You have to let me see what he's done. I need to see it," I said determinedly.

"What's the harm? We've already wasted a month. What's another day? Might as well just let the girl see it," Plutarch suggested.

Obviously he and Seneca agreed that I needed to go. Coin sat in silence for a few moments as I stared at her with narrowed eyes. My threat of being the Mockingjay would be enough to convince her. I knew that it would. Because I was finally letting them know that I was at least thinking about becoming the Mockingjay. Coin didn't look happy at all, but she knew that this was the way to get me to at least try and unite the Districts. Something that we desperately needed. Finally she gave a slow nod.

"You will have one hour once you arrive in District 12," Coin said. I nodded. Not wonderful, as I wanted more time, but it would be better than nothing. "We will send out teams to clear the area first and have a hovercraft nearby. A team will go in with -"

"No. I do it alone," I interrupted.

"Miss Antaeus -"

"Alone. Or no Mockingjay. That's my deal. Take it or leave it," I interrupted her again.

She set another glare on me. But I wasn't backing down. This was something that I had to do alone. "One hour. The hovercraft will be nearby. You'll have a headset to keep in communication with us the entire time that you're down on the ground," Coin said, leaving no room for argument on the subject.

"Tomorrow. I want to go tomorrow," I said.

"We'll call you when we're ready," Coin said, not bothering to argue with me on that point.

They had given me what I wanted. That was all that I needed. The promise that I could go home. Just to see... I just needed to remember the reason that I had hated the Capitol so much in the first place. Their cruelty. So I nodded and stalked off, without another word, not wanting to speak to them anymore. I noticed that Seneca had retained his place in the background. He was nodding at me. He looked proud of me. Just the way that I knew that Cato would have been.

Chapter 2: Chapter Two

The first thing I saw in the morning were the doctors. They were standing above me, doing their usual morning routine. First they played the game. Figuring out everything that I knew. My name is Aspen Antaeus. I am twenty years old. Today I will be going to see the ruins of District 12. I know that it will give me what I need to be the Mockingjay. My only chance to save Cato, if he is still alive. They didn't usually like me talking about Cato in the sessions, as they thought that it only made me more depressed.

But I refused to just forget about him. The doctors then played my other least favorite game. Going back and talking about everything that happened. The same thing, every single day. We then went over the breathing techniques, as the doctors believed that a panic attack was likely today. They didn't want me going back to District 12, but I had to see it. We then went through the eye movements and temple massage that they'd taught me to subdue the effects of the concussion.

Once they were finally sure that I wasn't going to have a panic attack right now and after I had reassured them about a hundred times that I was going to be fine going to District 12, they finally left my side. They were no longer giving me the medicine. The Morphling had since made its way out of my system. I was almost grateful. The pain from the concussion was back but I didn't feel quite as foggy as I had before. Although my hands were shaking and sweating. Withdrawal, probably.

But I knew that I couldn't say anything to the doctors. They would just put me straight back on the table and hook me up to some new intravenous medication. Something less intense while I detoxed. They would then suggest that I couldn't go back to District 12. They had barely wanted to agree to this expedition. They were convinced that it was going to be dangerous and damaging to my psyche. I had just laughed and convinced them that I was already long past damaged.

Just about an hour into the morning, right after the doctors had finished their daily routine, Boggs had come to tell me that there was only going to be about two hours before we were ready to leave and head to District 12. But then something occurred to me. There was someone else that I had to speak to before we left. Someone that I owed a big apology to. So I nodded at Boggs, letting him know that there was something that I had to do before we left.

He agreed without complaint. I had a feeling that Boggs and I would eventually become friends. He seemed to be one of the few people here that would protect me for more than the reason that I was the Mockingjay. He just seemed to like me. Before Boggs left, he also informed me on where my family was staying. Room 307. That meant that I would be staying there now that I was officially discharged from the hospital.

After a moment I nodded and moved to get changed for the day. I ran a brush through my hair but didn't bother to braid it back. I wanted to have something to hide behind. Just in case. I had been given the same clothing that I was normally in. The ugly little gray jumpsuit. Maybe I had picked up on some Capitol traits... Seeing as I wasn't technically a soldier, I couldn't wear the black uniform that Boggs wore. But even the jumpsuit was better than the slip that they had given me as a hospital patient.

Eventually, once I had everything together for the day, I made my way out of the hospital. Boggs escorted me down to the member apartments, which I had asked him to show me to, before heading straight for the Hadley's apartment. Boggs had asked me if I was sure that I wanted to speak to them and I had reassured him that I had to do it. He showed me their apartment and I nodded. It was straight across the way from my own family's apartment.

Taking a deep breath, I pushed open the door and walked in. It was far too small for the large family but they didn't seem to have any complaints. Even though they were all crammed together. Although I supposed that it was a little smaller without two of them here. Alana and Damien were sitting on one bed, with Carrie, Dean, and Marley on the other. Aidan was sitting on the floor, as Cato had once told me that he so often did. Skye and Julie were crammed together by the desk.

"Hi," I muttered awkwardly.

The door fell closed behind me. The family hadn't even noticed that I was here yet. But they spotted me now. It was the first time that any of us had even seen each other since I had screamed at them to get out when they had told me that Leah had been killed. Their heads whipped around to me in surprise. But none of them looked angry. They looked surprised, and maybe a little dumbfounded, but there was no trace of anger on their faces.

"Aspen!" Alana said, finally shattering the tense silence. She moved forwards and brought me into a hug. "Sweetheart... We're so happy to see you."

"I can't stay for long," I muttered dumbly, pulling out of her embrace.

The family looked a little bit happier, but they still looked tired and worn out. "That's alright. We're just glad that you dropped by," Carrie said, moving forward and hugging me.

"How are you feeling?" Dean asked, giving me another hug.

"Head hurts," I admitted.

"Can you take more medicine?" Skye asked, following the line of hugs.

"No. I don't want anymore medicine. It makes me hallucinate," I admitted. At least, I was reasonably sure that they were hallucinations. It was hard to tell sometimes. "I'm sick of the hallucinations. I'd rather just deal with the pain. It's the remnants of the concussion that Johanna gave me."

"They're letting you leave the hospital now, then?" Julie asked, brushing back a few stray hairs.

"They've been trying to get me to leave for weeks. I finally accepted the offer," I said.

"Really?" Alana asked, surprised.

Maybe people were a little more surprised than I had thought that they would be, now that I was finally up and moving around. "Yes. I'm ready to start... I don't know. Doing something," I muttered.

"We're very glad to hear that," Damien said, hugging me softly.

I nodded blankly at him, standing in silence with the family. "We hear that you're returning to District 12 today," Alana said, probably for the sake of conversation.

"Have they been telling everyone about that?" I asked curiously.

"They just let us know. We're family, you know," Skye said.

She wasn't even the Hadley's family, but I knew what she meant. No matter what, we were all family. "I know. I know that. I'm - I'm sorry," I said, stumbling over my words. "About when you came to visit me and I -"

"Aspen, you have nothing to apologize for," Alana said, interrupting my poor and pathetic attempt at an apology. Which I dumbly hadn't prepared. "You had just been through one of the most traumatic things that anyone could ever go through. You were under pressure from everyone and everything."

"I shouldn't have shouted at you all like that," I said.

"We should have given you more time," Alana said.

"We all did things wrong," Damien said, stepping in between the two of us. He placed a hand on each of our shoulders and we both smiled weakly at each other. "But we meant one thing that we said. We're your family. We're here for you. This isn't the time for us all to start pulling away from each other."

"I guess I'm just used to being on my own. Handling everything by myself and protecting everyone else - even Cato - from the truth. It's what I do," I said.

"We understand that. But you don't have to do it anymore. We're here for you," Julie said.

"Whenever you need us," Carrie added.

Slowly I nodded at them. "I'm going to District 12 because... I don't really know why," I admitted. "But I have to see it. I have to know what he did to my home. I can't just hear it. I need to see it."

"We understand," Carrie said.

"And once I see it... I'm going to agree to be the Mockingjay," I said determinedly.

That was when I saw it. The first spark of excitement that I'd seen on their faces in a long time. The first time that they'd looked like they might have had some faith that it could all work out. And it was the first time that I'd said it to someone other than Katniss and Gale. The entire family looked thrilled at the news. Skye and Julie exchanged an excitable look. The idea of being the Mockingjay was terrifying, but it was something that I would have to do. For Cato.

"Really?" Skye asked hopefully.

"Really," I confirmed.

"You have no idea how happy we are to hear that," Dean said.

"No happier than Coin will be," I pointed out. She would be thrilled that I wasn't fighting against her anymore. "Not that she likes me very much."

"She doesn't like anyone," Alana said.

"Definitely not me," I said.

"Doesn't matter. The people like you. That's what matters," Damien said.

Alana walked over and laid a hand on my shoulder. "Cato would be very happy to hear that you're going to be the Mockingjay. That's what he would have wanted. To know that you aren't going to give up," she said.

And I knew that she was right. I had always known that. "He's why I'm doing this. Why I'm agreeing to fight. Because I know that he would have wanted me to," I said weakly.

"He would," Alana confirmed.

For a moment I batted the idea back and forth about whether or not I should tell them. "I think he might still be alive," I spit out, before I could think better of it.

Obviously my words surprised them. Everyone looked over at me. I didn't want to give them false hope. I knew how cruel that was. But I also wanted them to know that there was the slightest chance that he was still alive. That was the chance that I was holding onto. Alana's face turned up in a small smile. Damien looked shocked. The others were exchanging looks with each other, trying to weigh whether or not my words had any merit.

"You do?" Julie asked.

"Sort of. I get the inkling that he might still be alive. Likely he already is dead. But there's a chance that he's still alive. Not doing well. They'll be hurting him. Torturing him. But they'll keep him around long enough to know whether or not I'm alive. And once they find out that I am, they'll use him against me," I explained.

They were all old enough to know the truth. Marley wouldn't understand me, anyways. "So we make sure that they don't know that you're alive," Aidan said, surprising me.

I'd gotten the feeling that he would never speak to me again. "I understand. Once you set foot in District 12, they'll likely know that you're alive," Dean said.

They would definitely know. Which was why I had to be the Mockingjay right after. Before they could do this again. "Yes. They'll hide it from the Districts, to keep them from banding together to fight, but they'll know. And soon enough they'll show me what they're doing to him," I said slowly.

Damien placed his hand on my shoulder. "It's okay. You fight, we move in on the Capitol, and we save him," Damien said determinedly.

That was when I saw it. The striking similarly that Cato had to his father. They didn't look that similar. Cato had light blonde hair while Damien had deep brown. But they both had those piercing blue eyes. They both had that fire that burned underneath their veins. Calm in the face of threat, but always ready to strike. His personality reminded me of what I knew Cato would have been like, had he gotten to grow a little older. He certainly was his father's son.

"And if not... It's okay. I might have lost a son, but I gained a daughter," Alana said.

I turned to her, smiling softly. She brought me into a hug. "Thank you, Alana. For everything," I whispered.

"Of course. You meant the world to Cato. More than anyone else ever could," Alana admitted.

"I know," I said, my voice breaking.

It was easy enough to see the looks of pity that the rest of the family were giving me. It was enough to make me blink back the tears that were threatening to fall. "I took something from the house before we left. I thought that you would want it. I was just waiting for the right time to give it to you," Carrie said.

It disturbed the quiet and peaceful world that we had been in a moment beforehand. My brow raised in curiosity. Carrie walked over to the dresser and picked something up. It was a photograph. A second later she handed it over to me. I took it and stared blankly. The breath immediately left my lungs. It was the picture of the two of us in the cave together on my birthday. The one that Cato had told me about. My head spun. Partially from the memory of the kiss and partially from the remnants of the concussion.

"Thank you," I said weakly.

"He used to say that it was that day, when he saw you on the riverbank, that he knew for a fact that he could never hurt you. Because of how he felt seeing you like that," Carrie said.

He had admitted to everyone that he knew he couldn't kill me when that had happened. "Yes... I know how he feels. That's how I feel right now. Knowing that he's hurt and there's nothing that I can do to help," I muttered.

"There is. Be the Mockingjay. Just like he would have wanted," Dean said.

"I'm trying," I said.

"You'll succeed. We believe in you," Damien said encouragingly.

"All of you?" I asked, looking around at the family.

"All of us," Aidan said.

I whipped back around to the young boy in surprise. "Thank you, Aidan," I said softly.

"And if Leah was here, she would have believed in you, too," Skye said.

"Speaking of Leah, I was wondering if I could ask you something," I said awkwardly to Alana and Damien.

"Of course," Alana said.

"I - I missed the funeral - which - which I'm sorry about, by the way," I stuttered.

"That's alright. We understand," Damien said quickly.

"But... Well... Where is she resting?" I asked, quickly realizing just how rude it was that I had said. "If you don't mind my asking."

Alana waved off my concern. "Oh. Of course not. They can't bury people in Thirteen. Not being below ground in essentially a metal container. The land above ground is too dangerous to use for burials, too. Not with the threat of incoming Capitol hovercrafts. They cremate those who die. Leah was cremated. Her urn... it's just over there," Alana said.

She was pointing off to the right. My gaze followed her hand and I saw it. There it was. Sitting right on top of the dresser. The ashes of a seven-year-old girl. My stomach churned in knots as my throat closed itself off. It was a soft green with a golden rim. It looked like it had been painted. It was likely just silver beforehand. There was even a painting on it. It was a pretty little tree. Something that looked like one of the oaks that were spread thinly over the woods back in District 12.

"I - I like the painting," I said weakly, searching for the right words.

"I did it. Cato took some painting lessons with us when he got back to Two. It helped him calm down," Julie explained.

So that was how he'd become a good artist. "Yeah... I saw some of them. They were really good. He did a self-portrait of me. The day before the Interviews..." I said weakly.

The family exchanged a quick look with each other. A moment later Skye walked over to the cabinet, pulled something out, and walked back over to me. "Is it this one?" she asked.

She handed me over the paper and I gasped. It the the drawing that he'd done. "Yes. How - How did you get this?" I asked, shocked.

"Seneca Crane brought it to us once we had been evacuated from District 2. He had gotten it from your bedroom, where Cato must have left it. He took it. Told us to do with it what we pleased," Skye explained. I smiled. Maybe Seneca really was my friend. "He would have wanted you to have it."

"I thought that it was lost," I whispered.

"Seneca must have known what it would mean to you," Alana said, smiling down at the picture.

"Thank you for giving it back," I said.

"You're welcome," Skye said.

We stood in silence for a few moments longer as I debated on how to bring up what I had wanted to come and ask them. It might not have been the nicest thing in the world that I could ask. It could end up sounding a little cruel. But it wasn't meant that way. I wanted to try and make things just a little bit better, a little bit easier, for them if I could. Since I couldn't do anything for Cato right now, maybe I could try to do something for Leah.

"I was - I was just wondering if you might want to do something a little... different for Leah," I stumbled over my words.

"How's that?" Damien asked.

"We have this Meadow back in District 12. It's where we spread the ashes of those who die. The children. These wildflowers grow out there. It's pretty. Untouched, I'm hoping, by the Capitol firebombs. I'll bring the urn back and you don't have to say yes. I understand if you want her to stay with you. But... I thought that you might want her to be in the Meadow," I explained.

Alana and Damien exchanged a look before smiling. "I think that we would love that," Alana said softly.

"Leah always did love flowers," Damien said.

"She would have liked to be in a field. With flowers," Carrie agreed.

"Like the one where Rue died." A small twitch from the memory of her. "Right?" Dean asked.

"Y - Yes. That's the Meadow that the song is about," I said.

"Leah liked that song," Alana said.

She must have heard me sing it when Rue was dying. "Cato did, too," I said softly.

"Did he?" Carrie asked.

"Yes. He asked me about it one day. When we were up on the roof, the day before the Interviews, I just started singing. After a while he asked me to sing the song that I sang Rue. And I sang it to him. He said that it was pretty. I told him that it was the meadow that I liked to imagine that everyone that I cared about was in. My parents, Thresh, Rue, Peeta, Cinna... Leah," I said.

Damien stepped forward at the mention of Cinna. "We were sorry to see what happened to Cinna," he said.

"That's okay," I said, even though it was anything but okay. "I thought that he was already dead. I wish that they had killed him earlier. I don't want him suffering."

"He loved you very much," Alana said.

"I know. I loved him, too," I said, remembering Cinna and I agreeing that we were each other's family. "I told Cato about the meadow and who I hoped was there. He told me that he would tell them that I said hello. He asked me if I thought that one day we would be in the meadow together. I told him that I believed that we had to be."

Out of the corner of my eyes I saw that Alana was crying softly. She must have never thought that Cato could be that kind of person. I hadn't thought so either. For so long I had thought that he was just a typical Career. But he had proven me wrong. Time and time again he had shown me the kind of person that he really was. The kind of man who would gladly give up his life for someone that he loved. Maybe that was why I hated him sometimes, too. Because he would be thrilled that I was still alive.

"That's good to hear," Alana whispered.

"He loved you so much," Skye said.

"I love him, too," I whispered.

"Take Leah," Alana said, handing me over the green urn. She took out a bag and let me slip the urn into it. "She would have wanted to be there."

"Thank you," I said.

A second later, there was a small tugging sensation at my ankles. I looked down and saw that Marley was motioning for me to pick her up. I leaned down and grabbed her, pulling her up into my chest, smiling down at her. She threw her arms around my neck and I noticed the rest of the family smiling softly as I laid my head down on top of hers. She reminded me of Prim when she had been a baby. She reminded me that there were still people out here to fight for.

"Will you sing?" Marley asked.

"Sing? What do you want me to sing?" I asked.

"About the meadow," Marley said.

"Okay."

The meadow was one of the hardest things to sing about. Because I now associated it with those who were closest to me. All of those people who had died. Everyone who I couldn't even count. My parents... Cinna... Rue... Peeta... Cato... Leah... The list just went on and on and on. And I knew that it wasn't going to end. People were going to keep dying all around me. But there was one thing that I could do. Fight back. Just keep fighting. I cleared my throat and looked down at Marley.

"Deep in the meadow, under the willow
A bed of grass, a soft green pillow
Lay down your head, and close your eyes
And when again they open, the sun will rise.
Here it's safe, here it's warm
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Here is the place where I love you."

The entire family was watching and listening. Marley's eyes were drooping slightly. It had been designed as a lullaby. "I can see why he liked it," Alana finally said.

"I'll sing it when I..." I trailed off, unable to say it.

"Thank you," Alana said, her voice breaking.

"Of course," I said.

My stomach roiled painfully when I saw that Alana was crying softly. She had been through a lot recently. Too much for a good mother. I stepped forwards and gave her a tight hug, gradually tightening my grip after a moment. The rest of the family slowly joined in, closing in on us from the sides. To my surprise, so did Aidan. Katniss was right, as much as I hated to admit it. They were my family. I just wished that it hadn't taken me this long to figure it out.

We all stood together for a while longer. I felt Carrie rubbing my back and Dean squeezing my shoulder. Finally the door slid open. We all broke apart for a moment to see that Boggs was standing right in the doorway. We must have been almost ready to leave. Again, just like before, Boggs looked oddly uncomfortable at the display of emotion. So I nodded at Boggs, knowing that it was time to go, and straightened up when Damien placed a hand on my cheek, briefly touching the urn. Their final goodbye.

"We'll be ready to go to District 12 in about an hour," Boggs said.

"Okay," I said.

"Soldier Everdeen would like to speak to you," Boggs informed me.

It sounded almost strange. Katniss was a soldier. Technically, so was almost everyone in the Hadley compartment. "I'll be right there," I said.

"Go on. We'll see when you get back," Damien said.

"I'll take care of her. I promise," I said, keeping a tight grip on the urn.

"We know," Alana said.

"Stay safe out there," Carrie said, giving me another hug.

"You'll be on the headset. Just let them know if you need to come back," Julie told me.

But that wasn't something that I could do. "No. I don't want to, but I know that I have to. I need to see what he's done. It's just something that I have to do," I said determinedly.

It was something that no one liked, but most people understood. So the entire family nodded and gave me their final well-wishes. Once I was sure that they didn't need another second with the urn, I turned and headed out with Boggs. The two of us walked out and headed back into the hospital. It was the last time that I would be here. At least, until the next miserable thing happened to me. As far as now went, when I came back I would start staying with the Everdeen's in their cabin.

Just a few minutes after we left the member compartments, Boggs dropped me off in the hospital wing. He allowed me to change into some boots that were sturdier than the one that I had been wearing before. It was the only part of the new outfit that I was being given. Goosebumps rose over my arms when I realized that it was very likely that I would be walking over some disgusting things back in District 12. I didn't even want to think about what I would likely encounter.

That was something that I could put off for a while. Slowly I flexed my feet around in the boots. They were the same ones that the foot soldiers would wear with the rest of their uniforms. Even though I wasn't technically a soldier, I would be down on the ground and that meant keeping me a little more protected. My feet particularly, which would be very open to infection if they were cut up. No. I wasn't a soldier yet. Not until I could manage myself and my affairs. Which was going to start with today.

Unfortunately one of the things that I really didn't like was the fact that I wouldn't be allowed to have any weapons on me when I was in District 12. I had asked about it last night and they had told me that there was no reason to be giving me one. After all, they would be watching over me and keeping me safe. The knowledge that I wouldn't have a weapon while I was so close to the Capitol's reach put me on edge, but I had agreed to it. Because it would be the only way for me to see it.

In the meantime I started brushing my hair out to try and make myself look the slightest bit presentable. Not that it mattered. No one would be there to see me. But I knew that I had to at least look like I was trying and hadn't been trying to commit suicide in every way that I knew how over the past few weeks. I had to pull myself together. I just didn't want to get dressed up. Not when I was about to see the almost seven thousand people that I had killed.

Plus there was the thought lingering in the back of my mind, wondering if someone might manage to get some photographs of me or something of the likes. Not that I really cared what I looked like to anyone. Not even to myself. But if there was a chance that they could get a photograph, and if it got back to Snow, I didn't want him to realize just how much he had managed to mess me up. I wanted him to think that I was still just as strong as I had always been.

A while later the door opened and Katniss walked in. "I don't think I've seen you move with that much purpose in a long time," Katniss said, noting that I was pacing back and forth.

"Haven't had that much reason to move with purpose in a long time," I said.

"Fair. You gonna be okay with going?"

"No. But I have to see it. I asked to see it."

"You don't know what you're going to find down there."

"I have a pretty good idea of what I'm going to see down there." We paused for a moment and I turned back to her. "Remember when Snow came to visit before the Victory Tour?" I asked.

"Yes," Katniss said, surprised.

"It wasn't just to visit me. It wasn't to check up on me. It wasn't even just to threaten Gale. He said something to me that I can't forget. Not then and especially not now. 'You should imagine thousands upon thousands of your people dead. This town of yours reduced to ashes. Imagine it gone. A radioactive buried under dirt as if it never existed, like District 13.' That was what he said to me when talking about my actions were causing the system to collapse," I said.

Katniss let out a deep breath. "Aspen," Katniss started, "you -"

"Can't even try to deny it," I finished. "Snow firebombing District 12 was my fault."

"But there's something that you can do to get him back for it."

"Yes. I can. And it starts with remembering who the enemy is and what they do."

That was what I needed to do. That was what would get me to finish this. "If that's what you need to do, let's do it," Katniss said, grabbing my shoulder and squeezing.

"Have you seen it?" I asked curiously.

"I saw it go up."

Her tone was short and shaky. It must have been a nightmare to watch our childhood home go up in flames. "But the aftermath?" I asked.

"No. No one's seen the aftermath. I don't think anyone really wanted to see it."

"Can't say that I blame them."

Katniss's gaze dropped down to the urn that was sitting on the table. "What is that?" she asked.

"The urn where they put Leah's ashes."

Her face paled. "What are you doing with it?" Katniss asked.

"I was thinking of heading out to the Meadow," I said, knowing that Katniss would know exactly which one I was talking about. "The meadow that I sang to Rue about. I was thinking that I could spread her ashes. Told them I'd sing the song while I did it. She likes flowers. Alana told me that."

"That's good of you, Aspen," Katniss said, looking a little sick. "So you've spoken to them?"

"Yes. I went to see them today."

"I bet they liked that."

"They seemed to. I apologized to them. They told me that I had nothing to apologize for."

"And they're right. You were distraught. No one blamed you."

"I blamed myself."

"I know. I like that painting," Katniss said, looking over the urn.

"Julie did it," I explained.

"Did she?"

"Yeah. Cato apparently took some drawing class with Julie and Skye after we won the Games. Something to try and help him cope with what he'd done. He was good," I said slowly.

Katniss turned back to me curiously. "Did he ever draw something?" Katniss asked.

"Plenty. This is the only thing that I have," I said, placing the drawing of me on the table. A second later I pulled out the photograph of us in the cave. "They saved the picture from their house."

The corners of Katniss's lips turned upwards as she picked up the frame and smiled down at it. "I remember this. You looked so happy. So stunned. That was when I knew that neither one of you were acting," Katniss said.

I smiled and showed her the picture that Cato had drawn. "And Seneca saved this from Cato's room in the Capitol. Gave it to his family. They just gave it to me," I explained.

Katniss glanced down at it. Her eyes widened. "He did this?" she asked.

"Yes."

"It's good. It's really good. When did he do this?"

"The day before the Interviews. We were up on the rooftop. I was making a flower crown and singing. We were just enjoying the peace. He was drawing me and listening to my songs."

She smiled again. "I wish I could have seen you two. That day. Carefree. In love," Katniss said.

The two of us exchanged a little smile. It had been so long since we had just sat and laughed and smiled together. I wished that she could have been there that day. I wished that they all could have been. Although it might have made things a little awkward, since we really weren't wearing any clothes that day.

"Me, too. That was the day that we really just got to be ourselves. Nothing else there. No Games and no Capitol," I admitted.

"We're going to get there one day. I promise," Katniss said.

"I'm supposed to be the older sister. The one that protects you," I teased.

Katniss smirked at me. "Every now and again I can be there to protect you. After all, you've already done so much for me," she said.

"I love you, Cat," I said happily.

"I love you, too," she said.

The two of us stared at each other before I opened my arms and Katniss fell into them. Just as she used to when we were kids and Mr. Everdeen had died. We just stood together for a long time. Neither one of us dared to move away from each other for a long time. The hug was something that I had so desperately needed. We had both needed it. I had missed the feeling of just a simple human touch. A hug. The forms of comfort that I hadn't had from anyone in a long time.

When we finally released each other, Katniss looked back at me. "Can you pick up a few things from the house while you're there?" she asked.

"I've already got the list going in my head," I said.

"Thanks. Do you want me to go with you? I - I want to see it," Katniss said, not exactly looking sure of herself.

"I need to do this alone, Katniss. I'm sorry, but I have to do this alone."

"I understand. I would have wanted to do it alone."

"If you really want to know, I'll tell you about it when I get back," I promised, almost wishing that I hadn't.

"I'm not sure that I even want to know what it's like down there," Katniss said.

"I don't know if I even want to see it," I admitted.

"I'm proud of you, Aspen."

"Thanks, Cat. I'm proud of you, too, you know?"

"Really?"

"You've been so strong. Even more than me. You've been strong for me when I couldn't be. You've been my Mockingjay when I couldn't be. You and Prim. Both of you. You're my sisters and I'm so proud of you both," I told her honestly.

"We're proud of you, too," Katniss said.

And I always would be proud of them. Because I knew just how strong and brave they both were. The two of us just sat together for a while. We collapsed back on the bed as we waited for the hour to pass. It wasn't something that I wanted to do, go down to District 12, but I had to see it. Katniss definitely wasn't coming down into District 12 with me, but she would be up in the hovercraft, watching me from above. One of the many people who would be keeping an eye on me.

A while later Boggs arrived back in the room. Katniss and I straightened up as we looked at him. He gave us both scrutinizing looks, probably curious if we genuinely were ready to go. Which we weren't, but it was time. I had to see what they had done. I had to know just how bad things were. Boggs waited a moment before telling us that it was time to go. We both nodded - unable to bring ourselves to speak - and walked with him out of the hospital.

We walked through the halls together as my hands bunched at my sides. The whole thing was incredibly tense. Because I knew what I was about to see. We headed into one of the elevators that appeared to be for service out to the hangars. Boggs lifted up a door from the bottom and we stepped out together, heading straight into the hangar. Finally people weren't staring at me quite as much as they had been. Because they all knew where I was planning on going today and didn't want to make me feel worse.

My hands were now shaking even worse than they had been before. We would be in9 District 12 within the hour. And deep down I knew that I wasn't ready to see it yet. Because I knew what I was going to find. It horrified me, to think about what was going to happen. To think about everything that I had already caused. Now I was finally going to see it for myself. I was about to turn down another hallway that Boggs led me down when a loud shout echoed behind us.

"Aspen!"

"Just a second," I told Katniss and Boggs. They both nodded. I turned back to see that Dean was waiting for me. "Dean?"

"Almost forgot something," Dean said.

He handed me over the fabric bag that had Leah's urn. I had almost forgotten about taking it with me. "Oh. Right. Thanks for getting it back to me," I said dumbly, grabbing the bag.

"You're welcome."

We both hesitated. I got the feeling that Dean wanted to say something else. "You alright?" I asked.

"Just wondering if you'd like for someone to come with you. It might not be a great idea for you to be wandering around District 12 by yourself," Dean said.

His words made me smile slightly. Everyone kept offering to go with me. But I couldn't take anyone with me. "It's something that I have to do. I know District 12. If they're out there I can find a hiding spot. I'll know where to go. And I'll just have to wait for the hovercraft to come and get me," I said, trying to reassure him.

"They're not giving you a weapon?" Dean asked, spotting my empty hands.

"No. They don't think I'm stable enough yet," I said.

"That's a little funny, coming from some of them."

It was enough to make the corners of my lips tilt upwards. "I've thought the same thing. I miss the bow. I got rather attached to it over the past few months," I admitted.

"I can try and get you another one," Dean offered.

"Would they listen to you?" I asked.

"I'm on their security council. I might get a say in what we can do for the Mockingjay. Once you officially agree, at least," Dean said.

"I'd like that."

"We're on your side, Aspen. All of us. Me, too. And I can be there with you right now, if you want me to be."

"This is something that I have to do alone. But thank you. I appreciate it."

"Anytime."

That was when I realized that maybe one day I would have wanted them to come back and see the District. "If they ever let me come back, if they even manage to calm everything down, I'll bring you back with me one day. I'll show you once it's safe to be out there. Once they... clean it up," I muttered, unable to say the truth of what they would have to do.

"I would like that," Dean said happily.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

"Why do you want to go to District 12?"

Obviously my question surprised him. "Excuse me?" Dean asked.

"Katniss wanted to go with me, too. But District 12 was her home. It's not your home. That's District 2, which, last I heard, was still standing," I said, trying to be as delicate as possible.

"Standing, but there have been a lot of issues there with Cato being in... the state he's in. Unknown, I mean," Dean said.

But at least they still had their home. "So why do you want to go to District 12?" I asked.

"Because Cato never really got the chance to see your home. He was there for a few minutes and a few hours a few different times. But he only saw your home and the Justice Building. That was it. He always wanted to see it, you know. He wanted to see the house that you grew up in. He wanted to see your Hob. He wanted to see the woods that you used to hunt in. And your meadow..." Dean trailed off, sounding like he might have been getting choked up.

Leaning over, I placed a hand on his arm. "Yeah. We used to talk about how I would walk him around the District and bore him silly with stories about what each place meant to me," I said, smiling fondly.

"He really wanted to see it, believe it or not," Dean said.

"He said that he did."

"For him, I wanted to see it. Since he might not ever get the chance to see District 12, I wanted to do it for him," Dean explained.

Immediately I knew that Dean was someone that was like an older brother. He was the kind of older brother that I would have wanted. He was the kind of older brother that I had now. Whether or not I wanted him around. He was family now. Something that I hadn't thought that I would ever have again. I had been so convinced that the last of my family was gone. But they weren't. It turned out that I had an astounding amount of family members still around. But I could handle myself.

"You know, Dean, you don't have to watch out for me. I think I've got enough people here watching out for me," I said, motioning around to everyone watching us.

"But how many of them do you trust?" Dean asked.

The truth was, I didn't trust very many of them. I trusted Katniss and Gale, of course. I had known them forever. I trusted Cato's friends and family, but I still had a hard time looking them in the eye. I likely would for a while. I trusted Prim and Ms. Everdeen, but they weren't fighters. Unfortunately my trust with Haymitch was broken and I had never trusted Plutarch. Coin was a definite no. I wanted to try and trust Seneca. Boggs was slowly starting to gain my trust.

"Very few," I admitted.

"You're my sister, Aspen. Whether or not you like it. Now and always. The only thing that I ever wanted was for Cato to find himself a good girl. And I know that he found one. With or without Cato, I'll always protect you," Dean said determinedly.

A good older brother. Protecting his likely deceased brother's wife. "Thank you. I don't need it, but thank you," I said honestly.

"I see why he was in love with you," Dean said, giving me a fond smile.

"Thanks," I said, blushing softly.

"I always knew that Cato wasn't just the Career-driven kid that he showed himself to be. I saw who he was at home. I knew that he wasn't like that. Not really. When I saw him with you in the Games, I realized that it would just take the right person to bring it out. And that person was you. You brought out the man that I knew that he was," Dean said.

"Is that why you don't hate me?" I asked.

"Yeah. Because I know just how happy you made him. And, no matter what's happening or will happen or has happened to him, he would think that it was all worth it. Just to get to know you," Dean said.

No matter what happened to him... He was right about that. I knew that he was. "I think I needed to hear that," I said, my hands relaxing slightly.

"Come by if you ever need to hear it again, okay?"

"Okay."

"Be careful out there. We'll see you back here soon," Dean promised.

The moment that he brought me into a hug I realized that I definitely would take him up on his offer to go and talk about Cato. Something that I hadn't wanted to talk about beforehand. But I knew that I did miss him. I wanted to talk to him. Because he knew my husband. Likely better than anyone. As we pulled apart, Dean placed a little peck on my cheek. I knew that this was what it would have been like to really have a brother. But, I supposed that he was my brother now.

But it was also that little peck on the cheek that told me something that I had been trying to fight back against. It told me that Gale was something more to me than just a brother. Because I felt something more than being with Dean. Not to the level that I felt with Cato, but there was definitely something there. And it was more than having just known him for a longer time. I knew that there was something there. But it wasn't something that I was anywhere near ready to acknowledge. Not now. Not ever.

After waving to Dean, I walked up to Katniss and Boggs, where they were waiting for me. "Okay," I said, nodding at them and adjusting the strap of the bag.

"Are you ready to go?" Katniss asked.

"Yeah. I think so. Let's get this over with," I said.

"Come on, then," Katniss said.

We would likely be back in District 13 within a few hours. I was already antsy to get back to District 13. I knew the horror that awaited me. At least I would be able to go back and be with my family. I would be heading straight back to the barracks the moment that I arrived back in Thirteen. Right now they were still trying to wean me off of the medicine so that I would no longer be under the influence of Morphling, which was both terrifying and thrilling.

As Boggs walked Katniss and I over to the hovercraft that would take me to District 12, I looked over it. Suddenly bile built in the back of my throat. We hadn't even moved yet and and I was already nervous. Because the hovercraft here looked just like the one that took the Tributes to the arena. It was rising on a platform as men and women were walking back and forth around it. Likely getting ready for takeoff. The doors opened on the other side of the launch pad, filling the hangar with light.

That was when I realized that I would finally see the outdoors. Something that I hadn't seen in a long time. Not since I had left the Capitol for the Quell. The plank for the hovercraft was already lowered and I let out a little groan. I felt like I was walking to my death. I felt like I was about to be back in the arena. Which, I supposed, in a way, I was. Because this was something that the same people who had tortured me in the arena had done.

Sirens and bells were echoing everywhere. My eyes widened when I realized that someone was standing near the lowered plank. We were about halfway there when I spotted Gale there. Of course he would already be here. Waiting for me. Leaving Boggs and Katniss behind, I rushed forwards and flung myself into his arms to embrace him. He tightened his arms around my back as I pressed my chin against his shoulder. We were best friends. I just had to remember that.

"I can't believe you're going through with this," Gale muttered in my ear. A moment later he released me and I stepped back. "You can say no."

"I need to see it for myself," I said determinedly.

"This way," Boggs said.

He was motioning towards the hovercraft. Boggs stood back behind us as Gale, Katniss, and I walked forward. Katniss and Gale trailed behind me as I walked in. The doors to the hovercraft closed as the engines began to whir and it raised up into the air. My entire body tensed as I remembered how I felt the first time that I was on one of these things. Gale stopped and looked over at me. I smiled and shook my head nervously and somewhat awkwardly.

"You okay?" Gale asked.

Katniss looped her arms over my shoulders. "We can stop this if you need. Or we can do in there with you," she offered.

"No. No. I need to see it. Sorry... This just looks like the hovercrafts that they use to take us into the Games," I said, looking around the darkened area.

"We'll give you a minute if you need," Katniss offered.

"No. I'm fine. Let's go," I said.

That was all that it took for them to realize that it was time. Now or never. And it had to be now. Immediately I took a seat near the front of the hovercraft, with Katniss on one side and Gale on the other. To my surprise, Boggs would not be going with us. But everyone would be watching out for me while I was back in Twelve. They would have visuals on me and they were giving me some type of comm to use so that we could speak and I could let them know if I needed to leave.

The hovercraft jerked slightly before rising into the air and shooting straight forward. I watched the windows for a while to see what was happening. I could see that we were leaving something that looked like a cave. As we flew through the air I noticed that everything around Thirteen was woods. Very pretty, a little greener than the woods back in Twelve. Of course the rest of Panem didn't know that they were out here. It just looked like empty woods.

The entire ride took about an hour. It turned out that District 13 hadn't been very far from District 12. Especially not with the ability to travel by hovercraft. The entire ride was spent with Katniss and Gale trying to get me to talk to them. Probably trying to make me feel a little better before having to see one of the worst sights that I ever would. I barely responded to them as they tried to talk to me. I was much more concerned about what I would find.

"What's in the urn?" Gale asked, spotting it inside my bag.

"Leah's ashes," I answered bluntly.

Katniss had already known what was in there, but she didn't like hearing it again. I could tell. Gale flinched slightly. Neither one of them wanted a little girl to die. They didn't want anyone to die. Except those who deserved it, of course. I knew that while Gale might not have loved Cato, he did like how he was always willing to save me. And he didn't have an issue with the two little girls in his family. They probably reminded him of Posy.

"I'm going to go to the Meadow at some point. Spread her ashes out there. It's more peaceful than being trapped underground in Thirteen," I explained.

"That's good of you," Gale said.

"She would have loved it," Katniss said.

"Yeah. The flowers out there are beautiful," Gale said.

They were trying to make me feel better. But I couldn't bring myself to say anything more. So I just leaned back in the chair again and pressed my head back against the cold metal. My hands gently ran over Leah's urn. Pain and loss. I had suffered so much of it recently. And I had realized something. They defined me as much as happiness or love did. Whether a world, or a relationship... Everything had its time, and everything ended. But until my time came, I would make something out of that pain and loss.

Finally the hovercraft gave a little lurch and I felt us dropping through the air. I didn't look off through the windows. I didn't want to see what was happening out there. We were back in District 12. Finally. As I tried to glace out, just to see something, but I wasn't tall enough to see out of them. Gale and Katniss were giving me concerned looks, probably trying to see if I would back out of it now that we were here. But I wouldn't. I took in a deep breath as the ramp lowered.

The three of us got up and stood at the edge of the ramp, holding onto the roof as we got to the ground. "Thirteen swept everything, top to bottom so you'd be safe," Gale called loudly, over the roar of the engine. "You sure you don't want me to go with you?"

"Yeah. I'm sure," I said.

"Call us if you need someone to come with you," Katniss prodded.

"I'll manage," I said.

"We'll have our eyes on you from above," Gale said.

"It's fine. I'll see you in an hour," I called back.

"Be careful," Katniss said.

The protective one, as always. It was something that had come out the moment that Prim was born. She became the protector. Something that I had always been. Which was exactly how we had ended up volunteering for Prim not that long ago. The two of them gave me quick hugs but they didn't linger for that long. Which was good, because I couldn't bring myself to hug them back. They didn't seem offended. Because they knew that I wasn't into it. Not right now.

They finally released me and I stumbled weakly out of the hovercraft. I wanted my bow with me. I had a terrible feeling that something was going to jump out and kill me. I knew that they were watching me as I stepped fully out of the hovercraft. The moment that I had and I was clear of the machine, it rose back up into the air. And that was when I realized just how bad it was. Because I was immediately hit with a pile of soldering ash and half-destroyed buildings.

The scent of smoke and ash was still heavy in the air. It smelled like they had bombed Twelve just days ago, not almost five weeks ago. It must have been bad if it was still this horrible out here. The smell in the air reminded me of the fire that the Gamemakers had set during the Games last year. It made my eyes water and the back of my throat burn. I was all too familiar with how it felt. Ash was blown into my face by the wind and I leaned over, coughing to try and clear it from my system.

It wasn't so bad that I needed to lean over and vomit like I had then. But that was when I realized something even more awful than all of this. People must not have just died from the firebombs. It was so much worse than that. Some of them likely had, but many of them must have died from smoke inhalation. Just the way that I almost had. I remembered the way that it felt like my internal organs were actually being cooked and how each breath had sent a searing pain through me. I knew how painful it was.

As I looked off into the distance I realized that this entire thing was a complete nightmare. Everything was still smoking, like it had just been burned down a few days ago. And the colors... District 12 had never been a particularly bright and shiny place. But we'd had the natural browns and whites. The colors that had always shown me just how simple we were. But I had loved it. And now the colors were gone. Everything, every single thing, was gray. Even the air seemed to hold a gray tinge.

Slowly I started to move forwards towards the Hall of Justice. The Justice Building. The very place where my own Reaping took place was burned to the ground and destroyed. Only a piece of the sign remained, sitting half-buried under the rubble that was once the magnificent building. It was hard to walk towards it as every step was covered with rubble. It made it very hard to keep my balance as I paced through the streets, getting closer and closer to the building.

Only the very shell of the building remained. I could see all of the wiring and piping that kept the building once standing that was sticking out. The stage that the Reapings occurred on was buried underneath the rubble. But I knew where I was. The same place that I had stood not even two months ago. When my second Reaping had happened. Where everything had really changed. My hand gently brushed over the rubble. Still hot. How was it still hot? Had the firebombs been that hot?

Fire... The Girl on Fire... If these hadn't been people that I loved, I might have laughed. Because Snow was very good at getting to me. He always had been. He knew what my weaknesses were and he knew how I would respond. He knew that I would hate seeing this. He knew that it would break me. I gently stumbled through more of the remains and I turned around in a circle, staring in horror at the bits of District 12 that remained.

Only the shells of all of the buildings remained. And those were only the buildings that had managed to survive the bombing. The stone and metal buildings. What had happened to the wooden homes? They must have been ash by now. I breathed in heavily - taking in more ash - before letting out a deep breath. My hands were shaking. I was terrified by the sight of it. This was what Snow had done. To destroy me. He had destroyed District 12. And almost everyone in it.

It was very hard to force myself to keep moving. I almost wanted to go back to the hovercraft. The further that I got in, the harder that it would become. But I had to see it. So I fought my way back to my old home. It was almost impossible to walk over the rubble and remains of the bombing. All of the paths and streets were gone. With each step that I took the rocks slid out from underneath me and I would come close to falling over. But I managed to keep myself upright.

Gradually I made my way to what I assumed was the interior of one of the larger marketplace shops. It was hard to tell without a point of reference. And I hadn't spent much time in the marketplace anyways. Even after winning the Games, I had always wanted to support those in the Hob. So I had gone and bought from them. Even things that I didn't need. Sometimes just to give it to those who did need it. As I attempted to walk down a sloping pile of rocks, I practically fell to the ground.

Everything kept shifting with my weight. I started walking back up an incline towards what would lead me to what remained of the Seam when I brought my foot down. Something cracked underneath it. I glanced down and slowly moved my foot off to the side. I immediately stumbled backwards as my hand shot to my mouth and I breathed out weakly. It was a human skull. Despite my best efforts to calm down, I couldn't. My entire body erupted into horrible quakes as I continued on.

The only thing that I wanted was to get away from the remains. So I stumbled backwards with my hand still over my mouth. It was the only thing that I could do to keep from screaming. I tried to tell myself that they were already dead. There was nothing that I could do to help them now. So I continued climbing up the rubble of what had once been a building. I was heading straight for where my home used to be in the Seam. But the moment that I made it over the crest I realized that the skull was nothing.

Because, right in front of me, was the worst sight that I had ever seen. Worse than anything that the Hunger Games could have thrown at me. Just two feet away from me was the beginning of thousands and thousands of human remains. Covered in ash. Barely recognizable. Some were piles of bones while others still retained their shape. The ash having settled over them only gave them a gray tint, adding to the obvious recognition that they were dead.

Some of the bodies still had their arms thrown up. It was obvious enough that they had been trying to crawl out. They must have been desperately trying to claw their way out of what had become their death chamber. Each one of them was someone that I had known. Someone that I might have spoken to. Someone that I might have loved. Not far from me was a dog sifting through the remains. Trying to find a meal. My breaths were coming in ragged gasps as I stumbled towards the remains.

Suddenly I was unable to hold my own weight anymore. I collapsed to the ground, my legs becoming rubbery and useless. I weakly crawled through the rubble, fighting back tears, staring down at the rocks and bones, trying to drag myself through the bodies. It was almost impossible to stop myself from having a panic attack. One that likely would never end. My entire body was shaking so badly that I could hardly breathe or move. This was what had become of my home.

Eventually I had managed to drag myself away from the bodies. I couldn't go through there. Because I would just want to sit and wish that I was dead with them. So instead I forced myself to my feet and tucked tail. I sprinted back through the remains of District 12 and away from the bodies of all of those who I had killed. My legs were shaking as I ran and more than once I collapsed when a piece of the debris would shift under my feet. But I refused to stop. I had to flee.

It was like with the Jabberjay's. I couldn't face them, so I had to run. On and on. Until I finally made it to a place that looked a little familiar. Some sense of normalcy. The scent of the flowers was barely enough to distract from the scent of smoke back in the District. I was in the Meadow. The Meadow just outside of the woods. It was the one place that I had seen in District 12 so far that looked like it might have been untouched. The sight of it made me take it as a good sign. It would be a happy place for Leah.

Keeping my voice low, I sat back on my knees and opened up the urn as I prepared to give the same goodbye that I had to Peeta's parents at his funeral. "Those we love don't go away, they walk beside us every day, unseen, unheard, but always near, still loved, still missed and very dear. For you, Leah," I whispered.

"Deep in the meadow, under the willow
A bed of grass, a soft green pillow
Lay down your head, and close your eyes
And when again they open, the sun will rise.
Here it's safe, here it's warm
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Here is the place where I love you."

The moment that I finished the song, I tilted the open urn over and released the ashes. The wind gently carried them away just a moment later. I watched for a long time, knowing that I was wasting my hour away, but refusing to move. I hoped that her ashes never got mixed into the ashes that were all that remained of District 12. I never wanted her to know about the horrors that killed her. I wanted her to be at peace in the Meadow. Maybe with Cato. Where I would eventually meet them.

Once I had managed to get back to myself, knowing that I had a limited amount of time to do everything that I needed to do, I knew that it was time for me to leave. I still felt horrible about everything that I had seen, but I did feel the slightest bit better about Leah. Taking a deep breath, I knew that it was time to head home. To all of them. The little one that I'd lived in back in the Seam. The one that the Everdeen's had shared next door. And the home we had in Victor's Village.

So I trekked back to my old home in the Seam. In the remains of what had once been District 12. I couldn't get over it. District 12 was gone and we were never going to get it back. Eventually I made my way over to my little shack. The snow didn't collapse the roof as I had thought that it would. As I had been expecting. But it was too early for the heavy snow anyways. Instead the ash had settled completely over the house, almost burying it. I ignored the call that it was almost time to leave and walked forward.

They weren't getting me to leave until I was good and ready. Instead I got down on my hands and knees and spent at least ten minutes trying to dig out the door to my house. Once I had, I entered the house. I folded up the bag that Dean had given me and grabbed my own game bag, tucking in their bag and Leah's urn. They would want it back. As I walked through the house, not that it was very much, I glanced around. The ash had dyed everything an ugly gray.

But the house had always been a tiny and pathetic little thing. I was surprised that it was even still standing. But I lived pretty far back in the Seam and most of the damage had been done up near the Square. Most of the damage out here was the ash. I walked over to the dresser and picked up the black-and-white photograph that I had of my parents, giving them a silent apology. Since I had destroyed their home. Then I took my father's hunting jacket and slipped it over my shoulders.

A moment of comfort. I missed the feeling of having my parents near me. A moment later I started to pace around the house, touching everything. One last time, because I doubted that anyone would ever let me come back here. Not just because of security, but because of my sanity. They were concerned enough about this visit. I touched the scorched cabinet that Katniss gave me before leaving the house, saying my final goodbye, and headed over to the Everdeen house.

Theirs was much easier to enter. I just had to force the door open and slip in through the narrow crack that I made. I stared down at my shoes, watching as a fine layer of ash settled on the tough leather. While my home was mostly untouched by the damage, their home was much worse out. It was larger and heavier. It had clearly taken more damage. My house must have been hidden by theirs. At least most of our things were in the house in Victor's Village. I froze after a few seconds.

Now I knew exactly where I was. Right where I was standing was the bed where Katniss had shared with Prim had stood. The bed that we had all crammed into so many times before. It was long gone by now, mixed in with the rest of the ashes of the house. Over just a few feet from where I stood was the kitchen table. The bricks of the chimney, which collapsed in a charred heap, provided a point of reference for the rest of the house. How else could I have oriented myself in the sea of gray?

Almost nothing remained of District 12. I realized it the more that I looked around. Everything was gone. As Katniss' voice came through my headset she told me that the only area that escaped incineration was the Victor's Village. Who could guess why? Perhaps so anyone forced to come here on Capitol business would have somewhere decent to stay. The odd reporter. A committee assessing the condition of the coal mines. A squad of Peacekeepers checking for returning refugees.

But no one was returning except me. At least, from Thirteen. And this was only a brief visit. Last night had been a rather large argument over my visit. The authorities in District 13 were against my coming back. They viewed it as a costly and pointless venture, given that at least a dozen invisible hovercraft were circling overhead for my protection and there was no intelligence to be gained. I had to see it, though. So much so that I made it a condition of my cooperating with any of their plans.

They knew that this was the only way to even hope that I was going to work with them. Finally, Plutarch threw up his hands in frustration. He had already agreed but the District 13 leaders were not happy when they'd heard the plan. He had given them the same argument he'd given me. That they might as well let me go. Better to waste another day than another month and how a tour of Twelve would be just what I needed to convince me that we were on the same side.

The same side. Were we honestly on the same side? I couldn't even think straight. But we couldn't have been on the same side. Not completely, because they never told me the truth. Because they never told me the damn plan that helped get District 12 burned to the ground. A pain stabbed my left temple and I pressed my hand against it. Right on the spot where Johanna Mason hit me with the coil of wire. The memories swirled as I tried to sort out what was true and what was false.

What series of events led me to be standing in the ruins of my city? That was hard because the effects of the concussion she gave me still hadn't completely subsided and my thoughts now were definitely having a tendency to jumble together. And the drugs were still making me see things. If I hadn't known that Snow was really as cruel as he was, I would have thought that the bodies that I'd seen back in the Square were a hallucination. My hands started to shake again.

It was enough to tell me that I would be in a state of panic in a matter of minutes. Not something that I could afford. They would come down here and drag me out, kicking and screaming if they had to. But I wasn't done here yet. There was something that I still had to do. So I used the technique one of the doctors suggested. Starting with the simplest things that I knew to be true and worked toward the more complicated. The list began to roll in my head as it had so many times before.

My name is Aspen Antaeus. I am twenty years old. My home is District 12. I was in the Hunger Games twice. I escaped once. I was pulled out the second time. The Capitol hates me. So many people have died because of me. District 12 was burned to the ground because of my actions. Cato was taken prisoner. He is thought to be dead. Most likely he is dead. It is probably best if he is dead...

"Aspen. Should I come down?"

Gale's voice reached me through the headset that the rebels insisted that I wear. He was up in the hovercraft with Katniss and a few other men, watching me carefully, ready to swoop in if anything went amiss. I realized that I was crouched down now, elbows on my thighs, my head braced between my hands. I must have looked on the verge of some kind of breakdown. Which I might have been. It wouldn't do. Not when they were finally weaning me off the medication. I straightened up and waved his offer away.

"No. I'm fine."

To reinforce my words, which I knew that he didn't believe, I began to move away from my old house and back in toward the town. Not that I wanted to be there. But because I knew that it was the way back towards where I needed to be. I was grateful that Gale and Katniss hadn't pushed coming into Twelve with me. They both understood that I didn't want anyone with me today. Not even them. Some walks you had to take alone. And I didn't want them to see what I had done.

The summer had been scorching hot and dry as a bone. There had been next to no rain to disturb the piles of ash left by the attack. Which only made things even worse. There was no rain to even start to wash away the aftermath of the attack. They shifted here and there, in reaction to my footsteps. But that was it. The little breeze that had been present before, while I had scattered Leah's ashes, was gone. Now there was no breeze to scatter them. Now that Leah was gone, so was the breeze.

As I walked I kept my eyes on what I remembered as the road. As I continued on I managed to walk straight into another skull. I accidentally kicked it and watched as it went flying away from me. It rolled over and over and landed face up, and for a long time I couldn't stop looking at the teeth, wondering whose they were. Probably someone that I had spoken to a million times before. Then I was thinking of how mine would have probably looked the same way under similar circumstances.

Eventually I managed to convince myself to keep walking. I stuck to the road out of habit, but it was a bad choice, because it was full of the remains of those who tried to flee. Just like in the street back near what used to be the Square. Some were incinerated entirely. But others, probably overcome with smoke, escaped the worst of the flames and now laid reeking in various states of decomposition, carrion for scavengers, blanketed by flies. My hands started to shake again. Seven thousand dead. All my kills.

In the Hunger Games, we were credited for those we killed or had a hand in killing. I was credited with over seven thousand people. An entire District, dead, because of me. I saw the remains of a body, someone with only one arm, and stifled a sob. Ripper. The woman who had so often told me how to handle Haymitch. Who had been one of the few to never treat me like a broken doll after I came back from the Games the first time. Eventually I forced myself to keep walking, passing more piles of remains.

I killed you. And you. And you.

Because I did. It was my arrow, aimed at the chink in the force field surrounding the arena, that brought on the firestorm of retribution. That sent the whole country of Panem into chaos. Everything that was happening in the Districts right now, all of the people who were still dying for the rebellion, more and more every day, were dead because of me. No matter who was pulling the trigger. In my head I heard President Snow's words, spoken the morning I was to begin the Victory Tour.

"You should imagine thousands upon thousands of your people dead. This town of yours reduced to ashes. Imagine it gone. A radioactive buried under dirt as if it never existed, like District 13. You fought very hard in the Games, Miss Antaeus. But they were games. Would you like to be in a real war?"

It turned out that he wasn't exaggerating or simply trying to scare me. He was, perhaps, genuinely attempting to enlist my help. But I had already set something in motion that I had no ability to control. And it was getting worse and worse by the day. The only good thing was that there was a chance that there would never be another Hunger Games. Because everyone in the world will be dead by the time that this war is over.

As I continued walking, I spotted another skull. There were so many laying everywhere. I was starting to get a little numb to seeing them.I stopped long enough to lean down and look at it. Did I know them? Probably. If not by name, by face. Because everyone knew their precious Victor. I could tell by the appearance of it that it was from a child. I put a hand over my mouth and let out a dry sob. More children, just like Leah, dead because of me.

Burning. Still burning, I thought numbly. The fires at the coal mines belched black smoke in the distance. I hadn't even realized that they would still be burning. Of course they would. No one put them out. There was no one left to care, though. More than ninety percent of the District's population was dead. We were mostly extinct. The remaining eight hundred or so were refugees in District 13 - which, as far as I was concerned, was the same thing as being homeless forever.

In the back of my mind I knew that I shouldn't have thought that; I knew that I should have been grateful for the way we had been welcomed. Sick, wounded, starving, and empty-handed. Still, I could never get around the fact that District 13 was instrumental in Twelve's destruction. That didn't absolve me of blame - there was plenty of blame to go around. But without them, I would not have been part of a larger plot to overthrow the Capitol or had the wherewithal to do it.

The citizens of District 12 had no organized resistance movement of their own. No say in any of this. They only had the misfortune to have me. Some survivors thought it was good luck, though, to be free of District 12 at last. To have escaped the endless hunger and oppression, the perilous mines, the lash of our final Head Peacekeeper, Romulus Thread. To have a new home at all was seen as a wonder since, up until a short time ago, we hadn't even known that District 13 still existed.

The credit for the survivors' escape had landed squarely on Gale's shoulders, although he was loath to accept it. As soon as the Quarter Quell was over - as soon as I had been lifted from the arena - the electricity in District 12 was cut, the televisions went black, and the Seam became so silent, people could hear one another's heartbeats. No one did anything to protest or celebrate what had happened in the arena. Yet within fifteen minutes, the sky was filled with hovercrafts and the bombs were raining down.

The wedding was a cover-up formed by Plutarch Heavensbee to bring in my family and Cato's and warn them what was going to happen in the arena. He had warned them to be prepared. The only good thing that he had done for me. It had informed them to be weary of an attack once the arena was destroyed. But they hadn't known what I would do and they hadn't known what the Capitol would do. They had only been prepared for a potential and likely attack.

District 2 had been placed under martial law. Because they were favored from the Capitol - and because Cato hadn't been stupid enough to jam his sword into the force field - they had been left mostly alone. Cato's family had evacuated to save themselves from a type of interrogation. Skye and Julie had come with them, as had a few other of Cato's friends. People that I hadn't met yet and didn't really feel the need to. It was during their evacuation that Leah had been killed.

Back in District 12, it was Gale and Katniss who thought of the Meadow, one of the few places not filled with old wooden homes embedded with coal dust. He herded those he could in its direction, including Katniss, Prim, and Ms. Everdeen. They had been concerned that the Capitol would do something extraordinarily cruel, which they had been completely right about. Which was a good thing. They might have saved no one if they hadn't reacted when they did.

Gale had formed the team that pulled down the fence - now just a harmless chain-link barrier, with the electricity off - and led the people into the woods. He and Katniss had managed to keep everyone who survived out of the sight of the Capitol bombers. They took them to the only place that they could think of, the lake that Katniss's father had shown us as children. And it was from there that they watched the distant flames eat up everything that they knew in the world.

By dawn the bombers were long gone, the fires dying, and the final stragglers were rounded up. Ms. Everdeen and Prim had set up a medical area for the injured and were attempting to treat them with whatever they could glean from the woods. It hadn't been easy, but apparently it had worked out alright. They had managed to keep everyone alive until they got to District 13. The real problem had been finding enough food to keep everyone from starving to death.

Thankfully, being raised in District 12, they were used to not having enough food. But not for days on end. They had all known that they would have to do something. Snares had been one thing, but they had only had so much rope and twine to use. And they had to wait for animals to cross their paths. So they had done as we normally did. Gale and Katniss had three sets of bows and arrows, one hunting knife, one fishing net, three throwing knives and over eight hundred terrified people to feed.

With the help of those who were able-bodied, they managed for three days. As they had both told me, they likely wouldn't have been able to make it much longer. People had already started to collapse but no one had died. They were in for trouble if they couldn't figure out what to do soon. And that was when the hovercraft unexpectedly arrived to evacuate them to District 13, where there were more than enough clean, white living compartments, plenty of clothing, and three meals a day.

The compartments had the disadvantage of being underground, the clothing was identical, and the food was relatively tasteless, but for the refugees of Twelve, those were minor considerations. They were safe. They were being cared for. They were alive and eagerly welcomed. That enthusiasm was interpreted as kindness. But a man named Dalton, a District 10 refugee who had made it to Thirteen on foot a few years ago, leaked the real motive to me about a week ago.

"They need you. Me. They need us all. Awhile back, there was some sort of pox epidemic that killed a bunch of them and left a lot more infertile. New breeding stock. That's how they see us."

Back in District 10, he had worked on one of the beef ranches, maintaining the genetic diversity of the herd with the implantation of long-frozen cow embryos. He was one of the few people that spoke to me like I was just a normal human being. He had found me one day after having a nightmare. He hadn't tried to calm me down. He had just spoken to me. But it had actually made things a little bit better. As bitter as Dalton was, I almost liked seeing him around. Because I was bitter, too.

He was very likely right about Thirteen, because there didn't seem to be nearly enough kids around. But so what? We weren't being kept in pens, we were being trained for work and the children were being educated. Those over fourteen had been given entry-level ranks in the military and were addressed respectfully as 'Soldier.' Every single refugee - from District 12 and beyond - was granted automatic citizenship by the authorities of Thirteen.

Still, I hated them. Those in Thirteen, all of the refugees, and every single other person who was still breathing. But, of course, I hated almost everybody now. Myself more than anyone. Although as much as I hated them, I really hated seeing District 12 in the state that it was in. Because I had grown up here. These people, as much as I had hated some of them, had watched me grow up. Some of them had loved my parents. What would they have said if they could have seen what I had done to their home?

The surface beneath my feet hardened, and under the carpet of ash, I felt the paving stones of the Town Square. I must have circled the District at least three times. But I couldn't stop walking. I just had to see what was going on. There was another call from Gale and I asked him to give me another half hour. The authorities wouldn't be happy with me, but Gale wouldn't argue. Around the perimeter of the Square was a shallow border of refuse where the shops stood.

A heap of blackened rubble had replaced the Justice Building. I crossed over it, at least knowing that no Reaping would ever be held here again. I walked to the approximate site of the bakery Peeta's family owned. Nothing much left but the melted lump of the oven. Peeta's parents, his two older brothers - none of them made it to Thirteen. Fewer than a dozen of what passed for District 12's well-to-do escaped the fire. Maybe it was a good thing that he was already dead.

Everything that he loved was gone. Now I just had to hope that he was in the meadow with his family. I felt sick at the thought that so many people in District 2 were dead, too. Plutarch had mentioned to me last night that there was a small rebel force there. They were the ones who had stuck up for Cato and me after the collapse of the arena. Many of them were killed. Cato's home was likely burned to the ground. His sister was dead, too. He wouldn't have had much to come home to. Except me...

There was a little bit of the shell of the bakery left. And the second floor - where they had lived - was still standing in some place. Maybe I could get up there. As I walked in, the first thing that I spotted was four bodies. Burned to a crisp, huddled together. His family. Rye, my friend. My legs buckled as I turned backwards and sprinted up the stairs that would likely collapse at any moment. It was a good thing that I hadn't eaten much lately. I had lost weight. Obviously enough to keep the stairs from breaking.

I couldn't even pretend that Peeta's family might have made it somewhere else. They were dead. Right downstairs. My breathing came in labored gasps as I leaned up against the wall upstairs. As my gaze slowly turned upwards I realized where I was. It was a place that I had only been in once before. I had ran straight into what was once Peeta's room. It hadn't been redecorated since his death. And it had been mostly untouched by the bombs. Just as my home had been mostly standing.

His family had let me in here just a few weeks after the Games so that I could see it. But I had barely been able to stand being in here back then. Now I wanted to linger. So I slowly paced back and forth through the room, also well aware that the floor might collapse. His room was nice. There were paintings sitting everywhere. Most of them were half-finished. A good amount of them had ash settled over them and some were burned from the heat of the bombs. He even had one painting still sitting out.

It was right on his bed. The paints and brushes were sitting off to the side. He must have been doing it before the Reaping. He had thought that he would be coming straight back here. He had never gotten the chance to finish it. I picked up the little painting, no bigger than a dish plate, and sobbed softly. It was of the meadow. He must have been thinking about it. I had seen Peeta the day before the Reaping. He must have been thinking about drawing Katniss and I into it. I saw the hints of blonde and brown.

Many of his paintings had Katniss and me in them. I had noticed that the first time that I had been in here. As I walked back and forth through the room, I picked up the painting and tucked it into the bag. I also grabbed one of his paintbrushes, a few cans of paint, and a plaque. It was the plaque that Peeta's family had received for his death. It wasn't the nicest memory, but I couldn't bring myself to leave it here. I wanted the memory of Peeta with me, not in this horrible place.

My stomach was churning in knots as I looked over the remains of the bakery. Not much and it would continue collapsing over the next few weeks. Soon it would be nothing but rubble, just like the rest of District 12. I walked back out and down the stairs. Just three steps from the bottom, the stairwell collapsed. I dropped to the ground and rolled forwards, grunting from the impact, and sprawling out a few feet from the base of the stairs. And right in front of the remains of Peeta's family.

It was enough to get me to gasp loudly and jump back to my feet. Gale's voice came back over the comm, asking me if I was okay, but I ignored him. Quickly I backed away from the bakery and bumped straight into something. Not again. I needed to pay more attention. Before I could stop myself, I lost my balance, fell backwards, and found myself sitting on a hunk of sun-heated metal. It burned my hands and I hissed, pulling them back off and into my lap as I got back to my feet.

Just like everything else in District 12, it was almost completely destroyed. There was barely enough of a shape for me to tell what it was. For a moment I stared at the remains of the metal structure. I puzzled over what it might have been, and then I remembered Thread's recent renovations of the Town Square. Stocks, whipping posts, and this. This was the remains of the gallows. Bad. This was bad. I knew it was as I started to breathe heavily in and out.

It brought on the flood of images that always tormented me, awake or asleep. Cato being tortured - drowned, burned, lacerated, shocked, maimed, beaten - as the Capitol tried to get information about the rebellion that he didn't know. It made me sick. If he was alive, I knew that was what was happening. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to reach for him across the hundreds and hundreds of miles, to send my thoughts into his mind, to let him know he was not alone. But he was. And I couldn't help him.

Running. Suddenly I was running away from the Town Square and to the one place the fire did not destroy. I passed the wreckage of the mayor's house, where my friend Madge lived. No word of her or her family. Were they evacuated to the Capitol because of her father's position, or left to the flames? Likely left to the flames. Ashes billowed up around me, and I pulled the hem of the jumpsuit up over my mouth. It wasn't wondering what I was breathing in, but who, that threatened to choke me.

Again I was reminded of running away from the wildfire in the Games last year. The first wildfire. The first one that had burned straight through some of the muscle on my thigh. No evidence that it ever happened, except for in my memories. My eyes were burning as I ran through the remains of the buildings. All of these people, all of these lives, that I had destroyed. My body was shaking again and my legs were threatening to give out. I was sure that I was about to drop to the ground.

The grass had been scorched and the gray snow fell here as well, but that was the only damage from the firebombs. The twelve fine houses of the Victor's Village were unscathed. I bolted into the house that I lived in for the past year, slammed the door closed, and leaned back against it. The place seemed untouched. Clean. Eerily quiet. My hands were shaking as I slid down against the door. Why did I come back to Twelve? How could this visit help me answer the question I couldn't escape?

"What am I going to do?" I whispered to the walls.

Because I really didn't know. People kept talking at me, talking, talking, talking. So many people had been trying to talk to me. Not that I ever really listened to them. Because I didn't want to hear them. But that didn't stop them from speaking about anything and everything. Plutarch Heavensbee. His calculating assistant, Fulvia Cardew. Someone who reminded me of Effie Trinket, but I liked far less. There were a mishmash of District leaders. Military officials.

But not Alma Coin, the president of Thirteen, who just watched. She had only spoken to me once, yesterday, for the first time. She was fifty or so, with gray hair that fell in an unbroken sheet to her shoulders. I was somewhat fascinated by her hair, since it was so uniform, so without a flaw, a wisp, even a split end. Her eyes were gray, but not like those of people from the Seam. They were very pale, as if almost all the color had been sucked out of them. The color of slush that you wish would melt away.

What they wanted was for me to truly take on the role they designed for me. The symbol of the revolution. The Mockingjay. It wasn't enough, what I had done in the past, defying the Capitol in the Games, providing a rallying point. I must now become the actual leader, the face, the voice, the embodiment of the revolution. The person who the Districts - most of which were now openly at war with the Capitol - could count on to blaze the path to victory.

Which might have worked. I could have tried to do it. That was why I came here. Because I was hoping that seeing what President Snow had done to my home would remind me of how much I had lost because of him. It would encourage me to fight back. I wouldn't have to do it alone, after all. They had a whole team of people to make me over, dress me, write my speeches, orchestrate my appearances - as if that didn't sound horribly familiar - and all I had to do was play my part.

It would have been easy enough. Just stand and give a written speech. Just like on the Victory Tour. But we saw how well that worked out. I tried to warn them about it, but they said that it would be fine. Sometimes I listened to them and sometimes I just watched the perfect line of Coin's hair and tried to decide if it was a wig. Eventually, I would have the doctors order them to leave the room because my head started to ache or it was time to eat or if I didn't get above ground I might have started screaming.

This was the first time in months that I had been above ground or out in the air. It almost made me wish that I was still underground in District 13. Because at least I couldn't see all of the damage in there. I wondered what it would look like in the other Districts. The ones that were fighting. Were they getting to this point, too? I would try to ask sometimes, but they didn't tell me. And if they had nothing to say that I wanted to hear, I didn't bother to say anything. I would simply get up and walk out.

Just like I had yesterday. The first time that I had officially met Coin. I had only seen her in pictures beforehand. But her hair and eyes had always fascinated me. There was something about them that I couldn't trust. I remembered being in a slight haze when people would try and talk to me over the past month. When the doctors wouldn't ask them to leave I would get up and go to the boiler room whenever I either got overwhelmed or just didn't want to listen to them.

Yesterday afternoon, as the door was closing behind me, I heard Coin say, "Maybe you should have rescued the boy instead."

Meaning Cato. I couldn't have agreed more. He would have been an excellent mouthpiece. Everyone liked listening to Cato. The way that he spoke in both of his Interviews. He was always a charmer. And the way that he would speak to me about what was happening in the Districts. I knew that he would have been much better than me. I wasn't a public speaker. I hated everyone and had a hard time speaking without getting angry, which would have been wrong for this purpose. I had to be strong, not bitter.

And who did they fish out of the arena instead? Me, who wouldn't cooperate. Even now, by the time that I got back, I couldn't be one hundred percent positive that I would cooperate. Beetee, an older inventor from Three, who I rarely saw anymore because he was pulled into weapons development the minute he could sit upright. Literally, they wheeled his hospital bed into some top secret area and now he only occasionally showed up for meals. Yesterday had been the first time that I had seen him in weeks.

He was very smart and very willing to help the cause, but not really firebrand material. He was a good man. Smart and kind. But those weren't the kind of people who were good for fighting. They needed someone who would be able to stand up and actually fight with the rebels. Then there was Finnick Odair, the sex symbol from the fishing District, who kept Cato alive in the arena when I couldn't. They wanted to transform Finnick into a rebel leader, too, but first they would have to get him to stay awake for more than five minutes.

Even when he was conscious, you had to say everything to him three times to get through to his brain. The doctors said it was from the electrical shock that he received in the arena, but I knew that it was a lot more complicated than that. I knew that Finnick couldn't focus on anything in Thirteen because he was trying so hard to see what was happening in the Capitol to Annie Cresta, the mad girl from his District who was the only person on earth he loved.

Despite serious reservations, I had to forgive Finnick for his role in the conspiracy that landed me here. He, at least, had some idea of what I was going through. He had been my friend for a long time beforehand. He had helped me through my first Games, getting me Sponsor medicine that had saved my life, and had comforted me when everything had happened with Seneca Crane. And it took too much energy to stay angry with someone who cried so much.

Slowly I moved through the downstairs on hunter's feet, reluctant to make any sound. I picked up a few remembrances as I walked. Things that I knew that Katniss, Prim, and Ms. Everdeen would want. A photo of their parents on their wedding day, a blue hair ribbon for Prim, Katniss's arrowhead that I had gotten her for her birthday. And the family book of medicinal and edible plants. The book fell open to a page with yellow flowers and I shut it quickly because it was Rye's brush that painted them.

What was I going to do? Was there any point in doing anything at all? Katniss, Ms. Everdeen, Prim, Gale, Gale's family, and those who remained of Cato's family were finally safe. As for the rest of Twelve, people were either dead, which was irreversible, or protected in Thirteen. That left the rebels in the Districts. And how could I help them? Giving a few speeches? Doubtful. They were already fighting. They were already encouraged to win the war. Wouldn't I just look pompous if I started giving speeches?

Of course, I hated the Capitol, but I had no confidence that my being the Mockingjay would benefit those who were trying to bring it down. How could I help the Districts when every time I made a move, it resulted in suffering and loss of life? Everything that I had done had caused people to be killed. During my first Games, during the Victory Tour, during the Quell, and now afterwards. None of my moves had been small and I had been paid back ten times over for each of them.

The old man shot in District 11 for whistling. The man in District 9 for his comments. The crackdown in Twelve after I intervened in Gale's whipping. My Head Stylist, Cinna, being dragged, bloody and unconscious, from the Launch Room before the Games. The horrible broadcast of his execution, likely a present from Snow to me. Brilliant, enigmatic, lovely Cinna was dead because of me. I pushed the thought away because it was too impossibly painful to dwell on without losing my fragile hold on the situation entirely.

What am I going to do?

To become the Mockingjay... could any good I did possibly outweigh the damage? Who could I trust to answer that question? No one that I could think of off of the top of my head. Certainly not that crew in Thirteen. I could have sworn, now that my family and Gale's and the Hadley's were out of harm's way, I could have run away. Except for one unfinished piece of business. Cato. If I knew for sure that he was dead, I could have just disappeared into the woods and never looked back. But until I did, I was stuck.

My ears were alert to any shift. That was why I spun around and stepped back against the counter at the sound of a hiss. In the kitchen doorway, back arched, ears flattened, stood the ugliest tomcat in the world. Thousands of people were dead, but he had survived and even looked well fed. On what? He could get in and out of the house through a window we always left ajar in the pantry. He must have been eating field mice. I refused to consider the more likely alternative.

"Figures. Buttercup," I said.

The cat was making all sorts of nasty noises. Probably complaining just the way that I was internally. He was probably irritable that I was one of the few that managed to survive the attack on District 12. Just the way that I was angry that he was one of the things that managed to make it through the bombing. How had that stupid cat managed to make it? The one creature that I might have enjoyed having dead. As I had threatened him with so many times before.

I squatted down and extended a hand. "Come here, boy," I whispered.

Not likely. He was angry at his abandonment. Besides, I wasn't offering food, and my ability to provide scraps had always been my main redeeming quality to him. For a while, when we used to meet up at the old house because we both disliked this new one, we seemed to be bonding a little. I had thought that he might have been starting to like me. Not like, but maybe tolerate. That was clearly over. He blinked those unpleasant yellow eyes at me.

"Want to see Prim?" I asked.

Her name caught his attention. Besides his own, it was the only word that meant anything to him. He gave a rusty meow and approached me. I picked him up, having a hard time keeping a hold of him, stroking his fur, then opened my game bag and unceremoniously stuffed him in. There was no other way I would be able to carry him on the hovercraft, and he meant the world to Prim. Her goat, Lady, an animal of actual value, had unfortunately not made an appearance. Likely dead, being out in the pasture.

"There you go. Oh, you're breaking my heart," I mumbled as Buttercup gave a loud howl.

Grabbing some medicinal herbs and concoctions that Ms. Everdeen had used on her patients, I started to slip them into the game bag, hoping that Buttercup wouldn't eat them. In my headset, the metal piece in my ear that sometimes screeched when it picked up interference from the Capitol hearing aid, I heard Gale's voice telling me we must go back. But being here had reminded me of a few more things that I wanted. I slung the strap of the bag over the back of a chair and dashed up the steps to my old bedroom.

At the last moment I turned back to Katniss's. Inside the closet hung Katniss's father's hunting jacket. Before the Quell, I went with her to bring it back here from their old house, thinking its presence might be of comfort to the rest of the Everdeen women when I was dead. Thank goodness, or it would be ash now. Which was good, considering that my house at least had made it through the bombing. Most of the Everdeen's had been incinerated.

The soft leather felt soothing and for a moment I was calmed by the memories of the hours spent wrapped in it. What would Mr. Everdeen have thought if he could see everything that had happened? That I had done? Maybe he would have been proud. Then, inexplicably, my palms began to sweat. A strange sensation creeped up the back of my neck. I whipped around to face the room and found it empty. Tidy. Everything in its place. There was no sound to alarm me. What, then?

Nothing. I was just overreacting. I had to calm down and try to remember that everything was going to be okay. I headed back downstairs, picked up the game bag, stuffed the jacket in, and headed into the study. As I walked up to the desk I picked up a picture of Mr. Everdeen and the picture of Cato and me. Our first kiss at the party before the Games. It was the only photograph that I had, save the one that the Hadley's had given me. I needed to keep it. Maybe to show them. They would like it.

Suddenly my nose twitched. It was the smell. Cloying and artificial. It reminded me of the scent of the garden up on the roof back at the Training Center. Something that set my nerves on edge. A dab of white peeked out of a vase of dried flowers on my desk. It was the only living flower among the dead ones in the vase. I approached it with cautious steps. There, all but obscured by its preserved cousins, was a fresh white rose. Perfect. Down to the last thorn and silken petal.

And I knew immediately who had sent it to me.

President Snow.

For a moment I held it in my hands. But when the goosebumps rose I dropped it back on the desk. When I began to gag at the stench, I backed away and cleared out. Where were they? Close. They had to be close. How long had it been here? A day? An hour? Roses couldn't be left out like that long. The rebels did a security sweep of the Victor's Village before I was cleared to come here, checking for explosives, bugs, or anything unusual. But perhaps the rose didn't seem noteworthy to them. Only to me.

Downstairs, I snagged a few more bottles from the kitchen, hushed Buttercup, who was hissing, and dashed off. I could hear the hovercraft up in the air as I ran along, bouncing the bag along the floor until I remembered that it was occupied. On the lawn, I frantically signaled to the hovercraft while Buttercup thrashed. I jabbed him with my elbow, but that only infuriated him. A hovercraft materialized and landed just a few feet from me. I sprinted up to it as the ramp dropped and ran in as the hovercraft took off again.

Gale helped me back to my seat. "You all right?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said, wiping the sweat off my face with my sleeve.

He left me a rose! I wanted to scream, but it wasn't information that I was sure I should share with someone like Plutarch looking on. Everyone in here would hear me and it would make it a nightmare. Because they already thought that I had been in far too of a fragile state to come here in the first place. A stupid comment about one live rose would only make everything worse. First of all, because it would make me sound crazy. Something that they already thought was a possibility. That I was permanently insane.

Like I either imagined it, which was quite possible, or I was overreacting, which would buy me a trip back to the drug-induced dreamland I had recently been trying so hard to escape. No one would fully understand - how it wasn't just a flower, not even just President Snow's flower, but a promise of revenge - because no one else sat in that study with him when he threatened me before the Victory Tour. The only person who might have understood was Seneca Crane, and they still didn't always trust him.

Positioned on that desk, that white-as-snow rose was a personal message to me. A personal message to everyone who knew President Snow. Who genuinely knew him. Not just the way that he made himself appear during speeches. Plutarch Heavensbee, Seneca Crane, and me. We were the only people who might have understood. And we weren't enough. But I knew that the rose spoke of unfinished business. It whispered, I can find you. I can reach you. Perhaps I am watching you now.

Out of the corner of my eyes I could see that Katniss and Gale were giving me concerned looks. But they thought that it was just because of what I had found. And it was. But it was so much more than the decimated remains of District 12. It was my newest warning. So I sat anxiously in my seat as Gale took his place next to me. My heart was pounding out of my chest. What was Snow thinking of doing now? I left the game bag in my lap and placed a hand on it as Buttercup began to growl irritably.

Katniss's head whipped towards the bag. "Is that...?" she trailed off.

"Yes," I said.

"You're joking. That disgusting thing made it?" Katniss asked, looking repulsed.

"Yes. I thought that Prim would want him," I said.

"Better make sure you hide him. I don't think they're too big on cats in Thirteen," Gale said.

He was right about that. We weren't allowed to have animals in Thirteen. At least, animals that we weren't planning on eating or skinning. And I oculdn't imagine the look on Prim's face if they told her that we were going to make gloves out of Buttercup. I would be able to hide him. We would just have to keep him in the room. We would figure out how to feed him and let him wander around. We sat in silence for a while as I stared at the other end of the hovercraft.

"You don't need to talk about it, just tell me that you saw what you needed to see," Gale said.

"I did," I said, not bothering to look at them.

They knew that it was the wrong time to try and talk to me. Right now I just needed to think. I had to sit and stare angrily at the other end of the hovercraft. I had to steam over what President Snow had done to my home for a long time. To all of those innocent people. I knew now what I must do. I had to go and get revenge for all of those who had died in District 12. For all of those who had died for my actions. They would not have died in vain.

After a while I started looking out of the windows. Someone from the Capitol had to have been close recently. Were there Capitol hovercrafts speeding in to blow us out of the sky? As we traveled over District 12, I watched anxiously for signs of an attack, not telling the others why I was concerned, but nothing pursued us. After several minutes, when I heard an exchange between Plutarch and the pilot confirming that the airspace was clear, I began to relax a little.

Gale nodded at the howls coming from my game bag. "Now I know why you had to go back."

"If there was even a chance of his recovery." I dumped the bag onto a seat, where the loathsome creature began a low, deep-throated growl. "Oh, shut up," I told the bag as I sank into the cushioned window seat across from it.

"I can't believe you brought him back here," Katniss said.

"I would have rather had Lady. At least she's useful," I said.

Gale and Katniss took their places next to me. "Pretty bad down there?" Gale asked.

"Couldn't be much worse," I answered.

"Was there -?" Katniss started.

"You don't want to know. Trust me," I said shortly.

That was the end of that conversation. I looked into their eyes and saw my own grief reflected there. That was our home. It had been for our entire lives. And just one foolish action on my part had destroyed it. Our hands all found each others, holding fast to a part of Twelve that Snow had somehow failed to destroy. The love that we all shared. The familial bond. He could do what he wanted. No one blamed me. They still supported me. They were still rooting for me to pull it together and be the Mockingjay.

We sat in silence for the rest of the trip to Thirteen, which ended up taking about forty-five minutes. I had a feeling that they wanted to be out of the airspace. Just in case. It was a mere week's journey on foot. Bonnie and Twill, the District 8 refugees who Katniss and I encountered in the woods last winter, weren't so far from their destination after all. They apparently didn't make it, though. When I asked about them in Thirteen, no one seemed to know who I was talking about. Died in the woods, I guessed.

From the air, Thirteen looked about as cheerful as Twelve. The rubble wasn't smoking, the way the Capitol showed it on television, but there was next to no life above ground. In the seventy-five years since the Dark Days - when Thirteen was said to have been obliterated in the war between the Capitol and the Districts - almost all new construction had been beneath the earth's surface. The only new development had been the hangars that were just underneath the low hills in the valleys.

There was already a substantial underground facility here, developed over centuries to be either a clandestine refuge for government leaders in time of war or a last resort for humanity if life above became unlivable. Which was a good idea, since apparently for some years the air pollution had been so bad that people had died from it. But it was well before the First Rebellion that the air had become breathable again. And it had remained that way since, seeing as only a few Districts put out pollution.

Most important for the people of Thirteen, it was the center of the Capitol's nuclear weapons development program. During the Dark Days, the rebels in Thirteen wrested control from the government forces, trained their nuclear missiles on the Capitol, and then struck a bargain. The bargain that would ensure that we would never hear about them. They would play dead in exchange for being left alone. Something that had actually stunned me out of my drugged state a few weeks ago.

The Capitol had another nuclear arsenal out west, but it couldn't attack Thirteen without certain retaliation. It was forced to accept Thirteen's deal. The Capitol demolished the visible remains of the District and cut off all access from the outside. Perhaps the Capitol's leaders thought that, without help, Thirteen would die off on its own. It almost did a few times, but it always managed to pull through due to strict sharing of resources, strenuous discipline, and constant vigilance against any further attacks from the Capitol.

Now the citizens lived almost exclusively underground. You could go outside for exercise and sunlight but only at very specific times in your schedule. Mostly so they didn't end up missing someone. With so few people in Thirteen, and disease being very likely in the close quarters, they had to keep an eye on everyone. You couldn't miss your schedule. Katniss had told me all about the scheduling works last night. Since I was about to start getting them now that I was discharged.

Every morning, you were supposed to stick your right arm in this contraption in the wall. It tattooed the smooth inside of your forearm with your schedule for the day in a sickly purple ink. 7:00 - Breakfast. 7:30 - Kitchen Duties. 8:30 - Education Center, Room Seventeen. And so on. The ink was indelible until 22:00 - Bathing. That was when whatever kept it water resistant broke down and the whole schedule rinsed away. The lights-out at 22:30 signaled that everyone not on the night shift should be in bed.

At first, when I was so ill in the hospital, I could forgo being imprinted. Before I had moved out of the hospital, but once they knew that I was physically healthy enough to start doing my duties, they had tried to imprint me. But I had panicked and trashed to the point that they had finally just written it down on a piece of paper. At that point I had been expected to get with the program. Except for showing up for meals, though, I pretty much ignored the words on the piece of paper.

Ignoring everyone who was trying to get me to get up and do whatever it was that I was supposed to be doing, I would just sit in the hospital and try to block out everything. I would sometimes wander around Thirteen or fall asleep in a place that was hidden. An abandoned air duct. Behind the water pipes in the laundry. There was a closet in the Education Center that was great because no one ever seemed to need school supplies. They were so frugal with things here, waste was practically a criminal activity.

Fortunately, the people of Twelve had never been wasteful. But once I saw Fulvia Cardew crumple up a sheet of paper with just a couple of words written on it and you would have thought she had murdered someone from the looks she got. Her face turned tomato red, making the silver flowers inlaid in her plump cheeks even more noticeable. The very portrait of excess. One of my few pleasures in Thirteen was watching the handful of pampered Capitol 'rebels' squirming as they tried to fit in.

In the back of my mind I had been realizing that I didn't know how long I would be able to get away with my complete disregard for the clockwork precision of attendance required by my hosts. Right now, they left me alone because I was classified as mentally disoriented - it said so right on my plastic medical bracelet - and everyone had to tolerate my ramblings. Plus they still thought that I was suffering from a miscarriage. But that couldn't last forever. Neither could their patience with the Mockingjay issue.

All of a sudden one of the screens in the hovercraft started playing the Panem anthem. The last time that I had seen something like this it had shown me Cinna's execution. I felt Gale and Katniss's hands tightening around my own. The people in Thirteen hadn't been able to intercept all of the transmissions from the Capitol that had been sent out. Apparently Beetee had been unable to break through their system, which was what he had been trying so hard to do since getting here.

"What is this?" I whispered.

"Warning, probably," Gale said.

President Snow's face filled the screen and I balled my fists. "Citizens, tonight I address all of Panem as one. Since the Dark Days, Panem has had an unprecedented era of peace. It is a peace built upon cooperation. And a respect for law and order. In the past weeks, you have heard of sporadic violence following the actions of a few radicals in the Quarter Quell. Those who choose this destructive path, your actions are based on a misunderstanding of how we have survived. Together. It is a contract.

"Each District supplies the Capitol. Like blood to a heart. In return, the Capitol provides order and security. To refuse work is to put the entire system in danger. The Capitol is the beating heart of Panem. Nothing can survive without a heart.

"The criminals that kneel before you use symbols for the purpose of sedition. Which is why all images of The Mockingjay are now forbidden. Possessing them will be considered treason. Punishable by death. Justice shall be served swiftly. Order shall be restored. To those who ignore the warnings of history, prepare to pay the ultimate price."

The screen went blank. It must have been a warning before an execution in the Districts. "Asshole," I growled.

"He's just trying to quell the fight," Katniss said.

"It won't work," I said determinedly.

"We know, Aspen," Gale said reassuringly.

From the look that Plutarch was giving me, I knew that it was his warning. To tell me that this would only get worse the longer that I said no to being the Mockingjay. And he was right. More people were going to die for me. The least that I could do was fight alongside them. The people who believed in me. Plutarch and I exchanged a long look. Finally, after what felt like hours, I gave the most imperceptible nod. It was time for me to get off of my ass and do something.

From the landing pad, Gale, Katniss, and I walked down a series of stairways to Compartment 307. We could have taken the elevator, only it reminded me too much of the one that lifted me into the arena. I was having a hard time adjusting to being underground so much. I liked the hills of District 12. But after the surreal encounter with the rose, for the first time the descent made me feel safer. I hesitated at the door marked 307, anticipating the questions from my family.

"What am I going to tell them about Twelve?" I asked Gale.

"I doubt they'll ask for details. They saw it burn. They'll mostly be worried about how you're handling it." Gale touched my cheek. "Like I am."

I pressed my face against his hand for a moment. "I'll survive."

"Ready?" Katniss asked, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"Let's do it. Hey. Don't tell them about Twelve, okay?" I asked Katniss.

"They don't need to know. I don't even need to know. You were the only person who needed to see it," Katniss said.

"Right," I said weakly.

"It'll be okay," Katniss reassured me.

"I know," I said.

Then I took a deep breath and opened the door. The first time that I had ever been in here before. I had tried to never drop by. Gale gave me a final nod before turning to see his own family. Katniss and I stood at the doorway. Ms. Everdeen and Prim were home for 18:00 - Reflection, a half hour of downtime before dinner. I immediately saw the concern on their faces as they tried to gauge my emotional state. But I was a master at hiding my emotions.

"It's okay. We're okay," Ms. Everdeen said, rushing forward to embrace me. I had only seen her a few times since arriving at District 13. "We're all here now."

A second later Prim heard Buttercup growling. "Buttercup!" she cheered happily.

"I smuggled him in. And I got Dad. And I got some of your herbs from the kitchen," I said, slowly taking things from the bag.

"They have strict rules. I don't know what they'll do if they find him here," Ms. Everdeen said.

Before anyone could ask anything about how I got him and what things were like back home, I turned the bag over and emptied it. Obviously Buttercup was not happy with being practically thrown from the bag. But it became 18:00 - Cat Adoration. Prim just sat on the floor weeping and rocking that awful Buttercup, who interrupted his purring only for an occasional hiss at Katniss or me. He gave me a particularly smug look when she tied the blue ribbon around his neck.

Of course Katniss and I rolled our eyes. Ms. Everdeen hugged the wedding photo tightly against her chest and then placed it, along with the book of plants, on our government-issued chest of drawers. I handed Katniss their father's jacket. She smiled and placed it on the back of a chair. For a moment, the place almost seemed like home. So I guessed that the trip to Twelve wasn't a complete waste. I took the photograph of my parents and Cato and me on the dresser.

"Thanks for grabbing all of it," Katniss said, as I spread everything else out.

"I had to," I said.

The last thing that I pulled from the bag was Peeta's last unfinished painting. I wasn't really sure where I could put it since there were no nails to hang it up and it felt a little too precious to just prop it up against the floor. So I pushed everything on the dresser forwards and set it down against the wall behind the dresser. In the back of my mind I couldn't figure out what forced me to take it, but I knew that I needed it. Katniss walked straight over to it and stared blankly.

"That's..." she trailed off.

"Peeta's. Yeah. I don't know, I felt like I needed it," I said.

"It's - nice," Katniss said, her voice breaking.

"Do you want it?" I asked.

She started to shake her head. "He was your friend," Katniss said.

"He would have wanted you to have it. He would have wanted you to like it," I said gently.

Katniss took the painting from me and placed it on her dresser at the side of her bed, gently touching the canvas. "I love it. Thank you," she said, her voice becoming very weak.

"You're welcome," I said gently.

We all knew that Katniss was never in love with Peeta. She hadn't known him, just the way that I hadn't, before the Games. But I knew that she had always felt some draw to him because of that moment with the bread. I knew that they could have made a good couple. So I sat with Katniss on the bed and told her all about how precise Peeta was with his strokes, telling her all about painting that I could remember Peeta telling me about. She had never looked so entranced with my words.

The four of us sat together for a while as Katniss and I talked and Prim and Ms. Everdeen played with Buttercup. We were finally heading down to the dining hall for 18:30 - Dinner, where Gale met up with us, when his communicuff began to beep. It looked like an oversized watch, but it received print messages. Being granted a communicuff was a special privilege that was reserved for those important to the cause, a status Gale achieved by his rescue of the citizens of Twelve. Katniss had denied one to stay with me until I would stand and fight.

"They need the three of us in Command," Gale said.

"Damn it. I was actually hungry," I growled.

"Afterwards," Gale said, grinning sideways.

Trailing a few steps behind Gale and Katniss, I tried to collect myself before I was thrown into what was sure to be another relentless Mockingjay session. This time they would harass me for longer, since I was no longer in the hospital. I lingered in the doorway of Command, the high-tech meeting and war council room complete with computerized talking walls, electronic maps showing the troop movements in various Districts, and a giant rectangular table with control panels I wasn't supposed to touch.

No one noticed me, though, because they were all gathered at a television screen at the far end of the room that was designed to air the Capitol broadcast around the clock. Apparently they were constantly airing things about how it was illegal to be a rebel, they would shoot on sight, martial law, and everything like that. All of the obvious things. There were even executions. Things that they were trying to use to intimidate the Districts. I didn't want to have to see it.

For right now I had seen enough of President Snow. Maybe for a lifetime. I was thinking that I might have been able to slip away when Plutarch, whose ample frame had been blocking the television, caught sight of me and waved urgently for me to join them. I reluctantly moved forward, trying to imagine how it could be of interest to me. It was always the same. War footage. Propaganda. Replaying the bombings of District 12. Which I particularly loved. An ominous message from President Snow. Just like earlier.

That was when I realized that there were others who I knew in the room. Cato's family - at least, the adults - were also in the room. They looked as curious as I now was. What were they doing in here? Dean was the only one who held the same status that Gale did. Maybe it would be a warning to District 2. But it wasn't. Instead it was almost entertaining to see Caesar Flickerman, the eternal host of the Hunger Games, with his painted face and sparkly suit, preparing to give an interview.

Likely it would be something about how the rebels were horrible people, we were only lying to ourselves about what we could and couldn't do, and another comment about how the 'Capitol darling' Aspen Antaeus was now fighting against those who loved her. Whatever. I rolled my eyes and turned to leave. They were the ones who had started this. Maybe we should show your people just what you did to thousands of innocent men, women, and children, and then we'll see who the real villain is.

"Hello. Good evening. And a big welcome to all in Panem. I'm Caesar Flickerman. And whoever you are, whatever it is you're doing, if you're working, put down your work. If you're having dinner, stop having dinner. Because you are going to want to witness this tonight. There has been rampant speculation about what really happened in the Quarter Quell. And here to shed a little light on the subject for us is a very special guest."

It was probably just some Gamemaker making me out to be the bad guy again. As they liked to do so often. Plutarch was trying to say something but I ignored him. Unless it was something important, I didn't care. But my footsteps were halted the moment that I heard Alana's mouth drop open into a shriek. My head whipped back around and I ran to comfort her. But I stopped again when the camera pulled back and I saw what she was screaming about. She was screaming because his guest was Cato.

Chapter 3: Chapter Three

A sound escaped me. What was it? That was a good question. Not a sound that I had ever thought that I could make. Not a sound that I had thought that any human being could make. It was the same combination of gasp and groan that came from being submerged in water, deprived of oxygen to the point of pain. I pushed people aside so that I could get to the screen. Even though I couldn't touch him, I needed to be near him. I needed to... just be there.

Some people stepped backwards to let me up closer to the screen. Others were trying to stand in front of the screen, just like I was. I practically stomped over Skye and Julie to get near the screen. They were trying to get close, too, but they stepped off to the side to let me be up front. Dean elbowed a few people out of the way so that I could be there. Cato's family was close, but no one was closer than me. Within two seconds I was right in front of him with my hand resting on the screen.

My entire body was flooded with relief. It might have been something even more than that. There was no way that I could tell what the feeling really was. It was just the happiest that I had felt in months. A number of people had told me that he was alive. They had said that there was a chance that he was alive and just being held captive in the Capitol. I had always thought that they were just trying to comfort me. But now I knew that it was the truth. He was alive. And I was going to get him back.

It just kept repeating in my mind. The idea that I was going to get my husband back. He was going to be back with me. He was going to be my husband again. Here, in District 13, safe and sound, where he belonged. In the back of my mind I had always been thinking that it wasn't a possibility. I had thought that he really was dead. But now I knew that it was the truth. He was right there. In the Capitol. Getting him back was a possibility. Not even just that. It was the eventual truth.

For a moment I broke my glance away from the screen to see what else was happening around the room. I had to know what was happening. Because it wasn't just me who would be thrilled with the idea that Cato was back and alive. There were a number of people who loved him. I wanted to gauge the reactions of the rest of the Hadley family. They were all clinging to each other, scattered throughout the room. Of course. Because they hadn't lost two children. I couldn't bring Leah back, but Cato was alive.

At least one of their children could be saved. Carrie had her head pushed into Dean's shoulder by now. I could see that her body was wracking with sobs. Marley was cooing at the screen, obviously recognizing her uncle. Skye and Julie had tears in their eyes that were about to slip down their faces. Their best friend was alive. Aidan had his hand over his mouth as he jumped up and down. Alana was down on her knees, sobbing wickedly, as Damien attempted to calm her down, hushing her gently.

They weren't sad tears. They were happy tears. Because her son was alive. She had lost her daughter, but her son was alive. My husband was alive... I noticed that Katniss and Gale were both looking at me. A number of people in the room were looking at me. Katniss was smiling, really smiling, for the first time in a long time. She grabbed my shoulder comfortingly. Gale had an unreadable mask on his face. He likely felt a little bit of happiness and depression at the fact that Cato was alive.

But he wouldn't say anything, even if he was angry, because he knew what this meant to me. My hand shot to my mouth as I let out another gasp and a strangled sob. Something very pathetic that was still choked. A second later my knees started buckling. A moment later Dean was at my side, keeping me supported. Carrie was smiling at me, her chin resting on Marley's head. Dean had his arms wrapped around me. I was about to cry as I rested a hand on his chest. But these were not sad tears.

"He's alive," Dean muttered.

"Cato... You're alive..." I whispered, my hand shaking against the screen.

"We're going to get him back, Aspen. We're going to get him," Dean said, his mouth near my ear.

A somewhat hysterical laugh escaped my throat. Cato was alive. He was okay. And it looked like he was safe. I turned back for a moment to notice that Brutus was in the room now. He must have been called in just when the broadcast started. He was standing with Alana and Damien. Of course, they were old friends. Brutus glanced over at me and gave me a little smile. The only one that he had ever given me. I gave a small one back, tears building in my eyes again. He was going to come back to me.

"Your husband is alive," Seneca said.

He had come up to stand next to me. I was so happy that I didn't care who was standing near me. So I threw myself onto Katniss and Gale, standing right in between them. They both laughed as I tightened my grip almost painfully around them. It had been a long time since they had seen me like this. A moment later I turned and threw myself onto Seneca, despite everything. He caught me in his arms, looking very surprised at my sudden actions and change of demeanor.

"I think that's the first time that you've ever given me a real hug," Seneca muttered in my ear.

In fact, I had a feeling that it was the only time that we had ever really hugged. "He's alive. I never thought I'd see him alive," I said, my voice very shaky.

Seneca pulled away from me a moment later. "I'll do everything in my power to get him here," he promised.

"Thank you," I said, my voice breaking.

"Anything for you, Aspen. I swear that to you," Seneca said.

His hand was on my shoulder and I nodded. Finally I turned back to the screen to look over Cato. I searched his so familiar eyes for any sign of hurt, any reflection of the agony of torture. There was nothing. Cato looked healthy to the point of robustness. His skin was glowing, flawless, in that full-body-polish way. His manner was composed, serious, as it was the first time that I had seen him at his first Reaping. I couldn't reconcile that image with the battered, bleeding boy who haunted my dreams.

In fact, he actually looked very healthy. He looked even healthier than I did. Of course, he was in the Capitol and they had the capability to keep him looking nice after the arena. I still had lingering scars and wounds. His hair had been shaved on the sides again and the hair in the middle had been brushed back. It looked like he had been shaved, too. He was in a pristine white suit that had obviously been recently ironed. He looked better than I could have ever imagined.

It was obvious that everyone else was thinking the same thing. That there was something strange about the way that he looked. I couldn't quite process the information. Had they really been taking that good of care of him? I had thought that they would be torturing him. Maybe he had been willing to work with them to get them to let him live. Maybe he had made a deal with them or something. Maybe he had been working hard to ensure his own survival.

In the end I supposed that it really didn't matter. I didn't care about anything like that. Not the muttering about why he looked so good. The only thing that mattered to me was that he was alive and looked to be rather well. Maybe a little nervous and off-put, but that was to be expected after being in the Capitol for as long as he had. We could talk about everything when he was here in District 13. Safe. With me. Exactly where he belonged.

The camera continued to pull back until it showed both of them. Looking reasonably pleasant. Tenser than normal but pleasant enough. Caesar looked about as demure as I had ever seen him. He was still dressed up but his personality was calm. He wasn't laughing, cheering, or waving. Maybe even he knew just how serious this was. Cato crossed his legs and placed his hands stiffly on his knee. Caesar settled himself more comfortably in the chair across from Cato and gave him a long look.

"Please welcome Mr. Cato Hadley," Caesar finally continued, after what had felt like an eternity. "So... Cato... welcome back."

Cato smiled slightly. The smile that I wished would have been given for me. "I bet you thought you'd done your last interview with me, Caesar," Cato said, as charming as ever.

"I confess, I did. The night before the Quarter Quell... well, who ever thought we'd see you again?" Caesar said.

"It wasn't part of my plan, that's for sure," Cato said with a frown.

My stomach twisted into knots. This hadn't been my plan either. Caesar leaned in to him a little. "I think it was clear to all of us what your plan was. To sacrifice yourself in the arena so that Aspen Antaeus and your child could survive," Caesar said, making my hand twitch slightly on the screen.

"Hadley," Cato muttered, almost absentmindedly.

That definitely caught Caesar off-guard. "Excuse me?" he asked.

"Hadley. She's still my wife. I haven't forgotten the wedding that you graciously gifted us," Cato said.

Caesar smiled slightly. "Of course. Pardon me. Aspen Hadley," he said.

Everyone was staring at me but I forced a even stare, looking straight into Cato's eyes, willing him to know that I was watching him. That I was here. But it wouldn't work. The only way that he would know that I was alive and well, here, waiting for him, would be if we could somehow get Cato and the others out of the Capitol. We would be able to do it. They would do it if they wanted me to play the role that they had already designed for me.

"That was it. Clear and simple," Cato continued, from Caesar's previous comment. Cato's fingers traced the upholstered pattern on the arm of the chair. "But other people had plans as well."

Yes, other people had plans. But not me. Cato knew my plan. To off myself so that he could live back in District 2. Because that was what he had always deserved. Had Cato guessed, then, how the rebels used us as pawns? How my rescue was arranged from the beginning? And finally, how our Mentor and fellow Tribute, Haymitch Abernathy, betrayed us both for a cause he pretended to have no interest in? How Brutus was the only one to keep his promise to keep me alive?

Suddenly my stomach churned with the thought that I hadn't bothered to think about before. Something that I had been too excited to see him alive to even think about. There was now the lingering fear that Cato might have been angry with me. Maybe thinking that I had been involved with this. But he had to have known better. Obviously he had to put on a front in front of the cameras, but I didn't know what he was saying that was real and what wasn't. His love for me... That was what was real.

In the heavy silence that followed, I noticed the lines that had formed between Cato's eyebrows. He had guessed or he had been told. But the Capitol had not killed or even punished him. Why not? Even to get to me, I would have thought that they would do something. Bruise him up a little bit, at least. For right now, that exceeded my wildest hopes. I drank in his wholeness, the soundness of his body and mind. It ran through me like the Morphling they gave me in the hospital, dulling the pain of the last weeks.

All this time I had been panicking over nothing. Because he wasn't dead. He wasn't even being hurt. Not like I had thought that he was, at least. Cato was alive and well the entire time. What a fool I had been. I should have thought a little harder. The Capitol was likely hoping that I would off myself after believing that they had killed him. That had been their plan, of course. Thankfully I hadn't actually gone through with it. Or it hadn't worked. Either way, I supposed.

"Cato, a lot of people feel as though they are in the dark," Caesar continued.

"Yeah, Yeah. I know how they feel," Cato said slowly.

Caesar chuckled softly. "Now, so set the stage for us. Why don't you tell us about that final and controversial night in the arena? Help us sort a few things out," Caesar suggested.

What was there to sort out? There was nothing for him to sort out. Cato didn't know the truth of the plans. I hadn't even known the truth of the plans until they had put me on that damned hovercraft. Cato nodded but took his time speaking. It didn't matter. Everyone, all over Panem, all of the people who had thought that he was dead, including me, would be hanging onto his every word, desperate to know what had really happened. At least, what Cato thought had happened.

"That last night... to tell you about that last night... well, first of all, you have to imagine how it felt in the arena. It was like being an insect trapped under a bowl filled with steaming air. And all around you, jungle... green and alive and ticking. That giant clock ticking away your life. Every hour promising some new horror. You have to imagine that in the past two days, sixteen people have died - some of them defending you. At the rate things are going, the last eight will be dead by morning. Save one. The Victor. And your plan is that it won't be you."

My body broke out in a sweat at the memory. A few more people had walked up behind me. To try and comfort me or pull me away, I wasn't sure. I felt Katniss's hand on my shoulder, but she didn't try to pull me away. Not right now. I wouldn't have left anyways. My hand slid down the screen and hung limply at my side. Cato didn't need a brush or pencil to paint images from the Games. He worked just as well in words. As he always had. His words were always an advantage.

They were what had attracted me to him, weren't they? Perhaps after his looks, at least. Of course... My heart gave a painful pang at his words. I was being an idiot. He had never once faltered on his plan. Even at the end. His plan was always to get me out of the Games alive. No matter what the cost could have been. He would have been willing to slaughter every person in there. Turn into the most violent and lethal Career in the history of the Games to keep me alive. Anything. Just if it meant that I walked out.

Which I had. At least, lifted out. Not what I had wanted. I wanted him to get out. I stared at Cato, drinking in the far-off look in his eyes. What are you thinking about? Me? Did he even know if I was alive or not? Maybe that he thought that he had given me a chance at a real life. A life that he had always thought that I could have had with Gale. The kind of life that I had only ever really wanted to have with Cato. And now I could... The moment that all of this was over.

"Once you're in the arena, the rest of the world becomes very distant," Cato finally continued. "All the people and things you loved or cared about almost cease to exist. The pink sky and the monsters in the jungle and the Tributes who want your blood become your final reality, the only one that ever mattered. As bad as it makes you feel, you're going to have to do some killing, because in the arena, you only get one wish. And it's very costly."

"It costs your life," Caesar said.

"Oh, no. It costs a lot more than your life. To murder innocent people? It costs everything you are," Cato said.

"Everything you are," Caesar repeated quietly.

A hush had fallen over the room, and I could feel it spreading across Panem. Anyone who had been speaking before was suddenly silenced. Because no one had ever heard someone speak like this. Particularly not a Career, who had once been jumping at the opportunity to go into the Games. No one had ever realized how taking the life of a child genuinely changed you. Some for the better... A nation leaning in toward its screens. Because no one had ever talked about what it was really like in the arena before.

No one had ever known what the true horrors in the arena were like. We were only allowed to speak so much about it. That it was hard. That it was scary. That was about the extent that they were allowed to say. We had never been allowed to speak freely like that before. But obviously things were much different now. Cato was not being monitored right now. At least, not as much as normal. Because things were already so bad all over Panem.

When had Cato become like this? Earlier than I had originally thought. Because of me. It started that night on the roof before the first Games. He had already been starting to change. But it was that night above the sleeping Careers. "Remember something. To murder an innocent person will change you. You'll never be the same. And there will be one person that haunts you forever." That was what Alana had told him. I exchanged a quick look with her. She was thinking the same thing. I could tell. Finally Cato went on.

"So you hold on to your wish. And that last night, yes, my wish was to save Aspen. But even without knowing about the rebels, it didn't feel right. Everything was too complicated. I found myself regretting I hadn't run off with her earlier in the day, as she had suggested. But there was no getting out of it at that point."

"But you didn't," Caesar said.

"No," Cato agreed.

"You were too caught up in Beetee's plan to electrify the salt lake," Caesar said.

"Too busy playing allies with the others. I should have never let them separate us!" Cato burst out. Caesar jumped slightly but Cato quickly regained his composure, speaking much softer the next time. "That's when I lost her."

A hand tightened on my shoulder. "Cato," I whispered.

"When you stayed at the lightning tree, and she and Johanna Mason took the coil of wire down to the water," Caesar clarified.

"I didn't want to!" Cato flushed in agitation. "But I couldn't argue with Beetee without indicating we were about to break away from the alliance. When that wire was cut, everything just went insane. I can only remember bits and pieces. Trying to find her. Watching Enobaria kill Chaff. She ran off before I could kill her myself. Trying to run off and find her, knowing everything was going to hell. I was just going to let them slaughter each other. We were going to wait it out. Spend a few days in the arena afterwards. We were hoping that they would just give us a few days. Just to be married."

"I think we would have all liked to see that," Caesar said quietly.

"I never got the chance to really be married to her," Cato continued softly.

"We were very regretful about that fact," Caesar said reassuringly.

He honestly believed that. But the rest of the Capitol just would have wanted to get it over with. I felt my stomach churning with nerves. My husband had been so determined to save me. The entire time. Even at the end. Even if it had meant his own life. He wanted to get a few nights with me. Then there begged the question. What would he have done? Killed himself while I slept so that I couldn't try and stop him? Wake up to be crowned the Victor? The thought made a silent tear fall.

"Tell us more about that night, Cato. What else happened?" Caesar asked.

"I know she was calling my name. Then the lightning bolt hit the tree, and the force field around the arena... blew out," Cato continued.

"Aspen blew it out, Cato," Caesar said.

"No."

"You've seen the footage."

"She didn't know what she was doing. None of us could follow Beetee's plan. You can see her trying to figure out what to do with that wire," Cato snapped back.

"All right. It just looks suspicious. As if she was part of the rebels' plan all along," Caesar said.

Obviously the quasi-friendship that I had once had with Caesar Flickerman was gone. Too bad, because I had almost liked him at one point. He had actually been rather kind to me. Of course, he likely thought that I was part of the plan to destroy the arena and start the rebellion. Faster than I had thought was possible, Cato reacted. Cato was now on his feet, leaning in to Caesar's face, hands locked on the arms of his interviewer's chair.

"Really? And was it part of her plan for Johanna to nearly kill her? For that electric shock to paralyze her? To trigger the bombing?" He was yelling now. "She didn't know, Caesar! Neither of us knew anything except that we were trying to keep each other alive!"

Looks were exchanged all throughout the room. I felt terribly for them both. I could see the lines of stress in Cato's eyes. He might have been treated rather well in the Capitol, but that didn't mean that he wasn't being constantly spoken to and interrogated. He didn't know the truth and he wouldn't until he got here. Caesar placed his hand on Cato's chest in a gesture that was both self-protective and conciliatory. Cato was still a very large man and was easily capable of killing Caesar without a weapon.

"Okay, Cato, I believe you."

"Okay."

There must have been Peacekeepers or something in the room. I could see Caesar looking over his shoulder and give an almost imperceptible shake of his head. Taking a deep breath, Cato withdrew from Caesar, pulling back his hands, running them through his hair, mussing his carefully styled blonde wave. He slumped back in his chair a moment later, obviously distraught. Caesar waited a moment, studying Cato carefully, probably wondering what was safe to say at this point.

"What about Aspen's Mentor, Haymitch Abernathy?"

Cato's face hardened. "I don't know what Haymitch knew."

"Could he have been part of the conspiracy?" Caesar asked.

"He never mentioned it," Cato said.

Caesar pressed on. "What does your heart tell you?"

"That I shouldn't have trusted him. That's all," Cato said.

But some part of him should have been happy about everything. Haymitch had promised to keep me safe. He had lived up to his promise. I hadn't seen Haymitch since I attacked him on the hovercraft, leaving long claw marks down his face. Still not something that I felt guilty for. In fact, the whole thing made me want to laugh. Because he deserved it. For everything that he had done and everything that he had lied about. I knew that it had been bad for him here. Not that it hadn't been bad for everyone.

District 13 strictly forbid any production or consumption of intoxicating beverages, and even the rubbing alcohol in the hospital was kept under lock and key. That made me laugh when they had told me that. A lot. Everyone had thought that I was finally losing it. But I wasn't losing it. It was the first time that I had thought that something was mildly amusing. He was just as miserable here as I was. Finally, Haymitch was being forced into sobriety, with no secret stashes or home-brewed concoctions to ease his transition.

They had gotten him in seclusion until he was totally dried out, as he was not deemed fit for public display. I had seen him go through a withdrawal once, so I could only imagine how awful it was to completely detox. It was bad enough during my slow withdrawal from Morphling. It must have been excruciating, but I had lost all my sympathy for Haymitch when I realized how he had deceived us. I hoped that he was watching the Capitol broadcast now, so he could see that Cato had cast him off as well.

Caesar patted Cato's shoulder. "We can stop now if you want."

"Was there more to discuss?" Cato asked wryly.

"I was going to ask your thoughts on the war, but if you're too upset..." Caesar began.

"Oh, I'm not too upset to answer that."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, absolutely."

"Thank you," Caesar said.

Cato took a deep breath and then looked straight into the camera. "I want everyone watching - whether you're on the Capitol or the rebel side - to stop for just a moment and think about what this war could mean. For human beings. We almost went extinct fighting one another before. Now our numbers are even fewer. Our conditions more tenuous. Is this really what we want to do? Kill ourselves off completely? In the hopes that - what? Some decent species will inherit the smoking remains of the earth?"

"I don't really... I'm not sure I'm following..." Caesar trailed off.

"We can't fight one another, Caesar. There won't be enough of us left to keep going. If everybody doesn't lay down their weapons - and I mean, as in very soon - it's all over, anyway," Cato explained.

"So... you're calling for a cease-fire?" Caesar asked.

"Yes. I'm calling for a cease-fire," Cato said tiredly. "Now why don't we ask the guards to take me back to my quarters so I can build another hundred card houses?"

Caesar swallowed an awkward lump in his throat and turned to the camera. "All right. I think that wraps it up. So back to our regularly scheduled programming," he said.

My jaws had set together. As the camera faded I tried to walk closer, desperate to keep the image of Cato in front of me. But it didn't work. Even standing right up against the screen, it didn't stop him from leaving. Caesar and Cato shook hands as it faded out. I made a strangled kind of noise in the back of my throat. I didn't care what he was saying. I needed to see him again. I needed to see more of him. I needed to constantly see him until he was back with me, to make sure he was okay.

But the image was gone. There was nothing that I could do for him right now and no way for me to tell that he was going to be left alone. It didn't matter. We had to do something. Anything. Saving him would come soon enough. But for now came something even harder than saving him. Now came the damage control. Because, as wonderful as it had been to see that he was alive and well, I now realized that he had done something very dangerous.

Music played them out, and then there was a woman reading a list of expected shortages in the Capitol. It was almost funny to hear what they had shortages of. Things that I had never had before I had won the Games. But things that they were so used to having at their disposal. Fresh fruit, solar batteries, and soap. All because the Districts were refusing to supply them. I watched her with uncharacteristic absorption, because I knew that everyone would be waiting for my reaction to the interview.

But there was no way that I could process it all so quickly - the joy of seeing Cato alive and unharmed, his defense of my innocence in collaborating with the rebels, and his undeniable complicity with the Capitol now that he ha called for a cease-fire. Oh, he made it sound as if he were condemning both sides in the war. But at this point, with only minor victories for the rebels, a cease-fire could only result in a return to our previous status. Or worse.

Actually, I knew that it would be much worse. Because now there would be two unsuccessful rebellions. What would happen? We would just keep rebelling, one District destroyed in each one, until only the Capitol remained? Cato was right about one thing. There weren't many of us left. Behind me, I could hear the accusations against Cato building. The words traitor, liar, and enemy bounced off the walls. Since I could neither join in the rebels' outrage nor counter it, I decided the best thing to do was clear out.

Before I could move I started to hear the shouts that were coming from the dining room. Of course. It was dinnertime. Everyone else would have heard the interview on the monitors. It had been played everywhere. Even in the Districts. Everyone would have heard what he had said. Cato would be an enemy of the rebellion soon enough, if he wasn't already. I just knew that I had to leave. I couldn't speak to anyone, and they would all want to know what I was thinking.

"He's one of them," one of the citizens in the dining room called.

"I can't believe he's doing this," another said.

"Traitor!"

More shouts followed. "He's not one of us!"

"This is treason!"

"You're a puppet!"

"Hang him!"

"Traitor!"

It was getting worse and worse by the second. They weren't thinking as rationally as I was. I knew what the Capitol could do to someone. I had lived through it. More than once. But they didn't understand. They thought that the Games were the culmination of their cruelty. They had no idea that it was just the beginning. They had no idea that what Cato was saying was for a specific reason. He didn't believe in a cease-fire. As I reached the door, Coin's voice rose above the others.

"You have not been dismissed, Soldier Antaeus."

"I'll be dismissing myself today, thank you," I called back.

"Soldier Antaeus," Coin warned.

I whipped around, silencing everyone in the room. "I've just found out that my husband, who you left in that arena to die, is still alive. I just need a few minutes to process everything," I snarled.

It put an end to the discussion. One of Coin's men laid a hand on my arm. I didn't even bother to look at who it was. It wasn't an aggressive move, really, but after the arena, I reacted defensively to any unfamiliar touch. I jerked my arm free and took off running down the halls. Behind me, there was the sound of a scuffle, but I didn't stop. My mind did a quick inventory of my odd little hiding places, and I wound up in the supply closet, curled up against a crate of chalk.

"You're alive," I whispered.

For once, my worst fear hadn't been confirmed. For once, I was getting exactly what I wanted. Almost. Slowly I pressed my palms against my cheeks, feeling the smile that was so wide it must have looked like a grimace. But it wasn't. It was a hysterical smile, one that only someone who was shocked beyond belief could make. Cato was alive. And a traitor. But at the moment, I didn't care. Not what he said, or who he says it for, only that he was still capable of speech.

A thought entered my mind as I laid back against the wall and laughed. He wasn't in our meadow yet. For some reason, that was all that I could think about. He wasn't with Leah just yet. But I genuinely believed that Peeta and Rue and my own parents and Cinna were watching over her. In the meantime, Cato was still alive and fighting. Not fighting, but he couldn't. It would make it worse for him. I didn't want him to fight. That was my job. His was to be there for me. He was going to come home to me.
District 12 was gone. It was burned to the ground and there was no way that it was coming back. So many of my friends and family members were dead. Lost to the world forever. But my real home, the one that I had found so unexpectedly, and didn't even want in the first place, was still here. Not with me, but that would change. I knew exactly how to change it. My home... It was still here. I just had to go and get it back. And I would. No matter the cost.

Cato's P.O.V.

All of Cato Hadley's life, he had never wanted to die. Not when he had made mistakes at the Academy. Those had only made him want to train even harder. Not when he had volunteered to go into the Games the first time. He had wanted to win, of course. Not even when he had met Aspen. He had wanted them both to live. Not at the end of the Games. He had just wanted to save them. Not even when the Quarter Quell had been announced. He had wanted to save her, but he hadn't genuinely wanted to die.

Things were different now. Death would have been something that he welcomed. A peace. A finality. Something that Aspen had once said... What was it? There's a finality in death. It's peaceful. Yes. It would have been very peaceful. Very pleasant. No one to hurt him ever again. He wanted to be dead. For the first time in twenty years, he wished more than anything else that he was dead. Because being alive was worse than anything else right now.

Nothing helped. They weren't giving him medicine to fight off the pain. That was bad enough. The pain was bad enough. He had tried fighting desperately. But nothing ever worked. Fighting only made things worse. They would beat him, practically to death. There was no chance to escape. Only death. That would be his only way to escape. But obviously death wasn't going to come to him easily. Because they were keeping him just healthy enough to stay alive.

It was obvious enough that no one else wanted to be alive either. The people who were near him, at least. He could hear the strangled screams of people. People whom he didn't know. He had a feeling that they must have been Avoxes. That would have explained those horrible noises that he was hearing. In the next room over was someone that he did know. He recognized her screams. It was Johanna. He could hear her screams echoing all throughout the night. She must have been hearing his, too.

There was only one thought that kept him alive. Otherwise he would have tried to do anything in his power to kill himself. But there was the thought of her nagging at the back of his mind. He wasn't sure whether President Snow was lying about Aspen being alive or not. But if she was alive, he had to help her. He had to keep her safe. He was willing to do anything, endure anything, to keep her safe. Because he loved her. And he always would.

It was the thought of being back with her, wherever she was, that was keeping him alive. The knowledge that he had to get back to her. They could still be together. There had to be a way for him to get out of here and get back to her. He would find out where they were keeping her or wherever they were hiding her. He could manage. After all, they had managed for so long. They needed each other. They had learned that a long time ago. She was the love of his life. He would find a way to get back to her.

Her face was all that he pictured whenever things got too unbearable. Which was quite frequently. Because just days after arriving in the Capitol, not long after that interview that he had made with Caesar Flickerman, the true horrors had started. The torture had begun and it hadn't once stopped. Not even while he was asleep. The torture had been going on for weeks now. Was it week? Months? Year? He couldn't quite be sure.

First it had started with the physical. Just three days after his interview with Caesar, men in masks had walked in and brought him out of his padded room, kicking and screaming. He had tried to fight them back but it hadn't worked. They had dragged him into the same room that he had now been in for weeks. He thought that it had been weeks, at least. They had strapped him down to the same table that he was sitting on right now. He had watched as the doctors had walked around him.

For a moment he had thought that it was just a physical or something of the likes that they would be doing. But it wasn't that. Instead they had placed pieces of metal on hot coals; that was when he knew. He knew that they really were going to torture him. The guards had stripped him of his clothes a moment later. He had tried so desperately to fight against the bindings and the doctors but it hadn't worked. They had merely taken the pieces of metal and placed them down against Cato's naked body.

One had gone straight across his throat, burning into his vocal chords. More had gone over his chest and stomach. Thighs and feet and hands. Everywhere, with the exception of his face. In case they needed him in front of a camera. Not long after that, they had taken a few chains from the walls and hung him there. The handcuffs had kept him firmly locked in his place. He couldn't move. Not from already being weak and not from the pain that was radiating from the fire.

Not long afterwards, without his body even getting a chance to recover from the burns, he had been subjected to a whipping. Just the way that Aspen once had. It happened over and over and over again. Down his entire back, over his torso and stomach, and against his legs. Cutting almost down to the bone from the strength of the impacts. It happened until his entire body was torn open and raw. They had only stopped long enough to close and treat the wounds to keep him healthy enough to survive.

The moment that the wounds had sealed, they had released him from the restraints. He had been so weak that he had instantly collapsed to the ground. But that hadn't stopped them from coming in. Peacekeepers. Hoards of them. They had come and beaten him with their fists, brass knuckles, and gloves with spikes on them. Harder than he had ever been hit. Already too weak to be able to fight back. So he had just laid there and taken it. Waiting for it to end. He was sure that they had broken a few bones.

Those were just some of the first ways that they had tried to hurt him. After that, things had only gotten worse. The beatings had just changed after that. They would use either their hands or fabric or some type of tougher material to wrap around his throat and tighten. More and more and more until he couldn't breathe. They would only stop when he was sure that he couldn't take it anymore and he was going to die. It would then take hours for him to be able to breathe normally again.

But that didn't mean that they would wait for him to recover. They would just make things even worse. They had a habit of taking heavy metal blocks and placing them down on his chest. They would get heavier and heavier until he was sure that he was about to die. They would bruise his chest so badly that he was sure that the bruises would never go away. But they wouldn't let him die. Not until they were good and ready. So the blocks would only remain on him for so long.

Other times they would take knives of all sizes, some large and some small, and run them over his body. It reminded him of the way that he had once seen Clove try to do to Aspen. They would sometimes just make small slits in his body. Other times they would run them over his veins, practically bleeding him dry, like an animal, before stitching him up and waiting. Sometimes they would just give him small stab wounds, twisting the knife, cutting into the muscle.

He would be shocked if he would ever be able to walk again. Even stand. There were the times that they would strap him down and peel off his fingernails and toenails. One by one. One for each time that he gave them an answer that they didn't like. Or they would try to drown him; shoving him underneath the water and holding him there as he fought for breath, only bringing him back up once he was about to die. He would lean over and throw the water up, feeling that familiar burn deep in his lungs.

Recently they had brought him back to the table, strapping him down again, and placing electrical simulators against his body. More questions. Some he knew the answer to, many that he didn't. Every time that they got an answer that they didn't like, they would send a shock that he was sure would stop his heart. At first it was just like touching a doorknob on an icy winter day. By the end they were even worse than the one that had hit him in the arena.

Then there were the more mental forms of torture that they had gone through. Sleep deprivation was the worst. Every time that he would start to drift off, they would hit or stab him, waking him up. He was sure that he didn't sleep more than half an hour at a time now. Or they would play deafening music for hours on end. They were barely feeding him. The food that they did give him was enough that a dog would deny. The water was dirty and likely somewhat poisonous.

The worst that they had done to him was the pain simulators. Pads of all sizes were placed down along his body to simulate different kinds of pain. Despite the fact that they were just shocks that hit him, they were excruciating. In every single way. The pain was always something different. Sometimes it felt like knives were stabbing him or he was being shot or his skin was being torn off in chunks. Even better were the moments that it felt like his intestines were being slowly ripped out.

It never left more of a mark than a red spot from being burned, but it was the worst kind of pain. From time to time he could feel something happen. It was something that was being pumped into his body. More than likely a sedative. But it was heavier. It felt almost like liquid lead was being pumped into his body. It also gave him strange hallucinations. Or maybe that was from the lack of food. It didn't matter. He couldn't fight back against the bindings. He was too weak anyways.

The only time that he didn't feel the sedative was when they were questioning him. It was never President Snow or Caesar Flickerman. It was always one of the doctors. They had hooked him up to all kinds of different machines to see whether or not he was telling the truth. But it always said that he was. So instead they simply used him as a punching bag, probably to vent their frustration. It only added to the fuzziness in his head that was worsening with each passing day.

Today it seemed that they were playing at something different. He was strapped down to the metal table that he had become so accustomed to. There was no way for him to move, more than simply arching his back slightly. A screen lowered in front of him and he groaned. He didn't want to have to hear or see whatever it was that they wanted to show him. Especially not if it was what was happening to the other prisoners. He just wanted to try and leave. He wanted to go back to her.

The screen faded in and showed a deep red room. Somewhere in the Capitol, more than likely. That was when he saw her. Aspen. Her name slipped out of his mouth, barely audible. For a moment he thought that she was here. But it was a recording. It was from the night of their engagement. He recognized her in the red and white dress from that night. Cato smiled at the sight of her. She looked beautiful. It must have been from the night that she was asked to see Seneca Crane.

Just as Cato had come to that conclusion, the figures on the screen started to move. He saw Aspen glance off to the side as Seneca Crane came into the room. The two exchanged niceties as he walked towards her and offered her a drink, which she graciously accepted. Cato watched the screen curiously. He didn't know much about what had happened during their meetings. The two of them were standing very close together. Far closer than Cato was comfortable with.

"You look absolutely gorgeous," Seneca said, his fingers tracing the neckline to the dress.

Cato squirmed slightly. Why wasn't she pushing him away? "Thank you," she said sweetly.

The two of them laughed. Cato found himself wishing that he could look away, but being unable to do that. Instead Seneca grabbed her arms and turned her around. The breath caught in Cato's throat as he caught her zipper to the dress in between his fingers and pulled it down. She immediately allowed it to drop to the floor and pool around her. Sensing where this was going, Cato began jerking against the binds. She wouldn't have done that. She loved him. Not Crane.

His head was being held down by another one of the straps. He was unable to look anywhere but at the screen, as much as he wanted to look anywhere else. Or smash the screen to bits. He knew for a fact that he was the only man that she had ever been with. She had told him that and it had been obvious enough. He knew that she loved him. Desperate to think about anything else, he thought back on the first time that the two of them had been together. That night, actually.

She was embarrassed. He could tell. She had caught her breath and now she looked like she wanted to bury her head in the sand. She turned over to him and pressed her head into his chest, blushing softly as he pulled the covers over her. His chest was rumbling with laughter. Not at her. She had done nothing wrong. It was just cute how bashful she was about it. Something that he had never experienced. He had never been with someone like her. She whined softly and dug her head down a little bit further into his shoulder.

"Stop laughing," she barked, her voice muffled.

Cato grinned and pulled her to roll over and face him. Her face was a little red. "I'm not laughing. Not at you. It's okay. You didn't do anything wrong," he comforted her, running his hands over her arm.

"I just laid there the whole time," she said.

"That doesn't make it bad."

"But you've been with... I don't know. At least, a number of girls. They had to have been better than me. Right?"

A strange pang shot through him. In a way, this had been his first time, too. Because he had never attached emotion to it before. Not the way that he just had. "No. No one was ever better than you. No one will ever be better than you. I wish there had never been anyone but you," he said honestly.

Her face became a little redder. "But... I still didn't do anything," she mumbled.

"You'll get better. It'll get better."

"It wasn't bad. I just didn't do anything."

"That's how it goes the first time around. It takes some time to get used to it. But this was wonderful, Aspen. Are you okay?" he asked, hoping that he hadn't hurt her.

For the first time, she smiled. "I'm fine. Better than fine, actually," she said.

"You did everything right. It was perfect."

"Good. Thanks for not laughing. Even though you did laugh a little bit."

"Because you're bright red. You're embarrassed and it's cute," he teased, grabbing the bottom of her chin lovingly. "But I'll never laugh at you for it. You might be a little sore in the morning, though."

"Oh, I'm used to it by now. Being sore in the morning, I mean."

"Are you okay?" he repeated.

"Of course. I'm with you. I'm happy. And I love you."

"I love you, too. Now and always. Go to bed. You're safe."

"I know," she said, tucking herself into his chest.

The night was slightly fuzzy now. It had always been such a clear memory. Why was he having almost a hard time remembering seeing her that night? As they had fallen asleep together... It didn't matter. He knew that their night together was the truth. Not this. It had to be a lie. He knew that it was. The scene that was on the monitor was from hours before he had slept with her. And she had bled when they had been together. It had to be a lie... But still... It looked so real...

"Do you think that he actually believes that you love him?" Crane asked, pressing a kiss against her throat.

"Of course he does. He's a fool," Aspen said, laughing.

"There's only one man that you belong to," Crane growled.

"You think that I don't know that? You're the one that I love. I failed to kill him in the arena." Cato wrestled against the binds. She loved him. She had saved him. "But I won't keep failing. It will work, my love. I promise," Aspen whispered.

"Good. Come here," Crane said.

"With pleasure."

Her voice... It didn't even sound like hers. It was too teasing. A little too happy. It just wasn't hers. It wasn't her. He didn't know what they had done to the video, but it wasn't her. It couldn't have been. Cato fought back against the bounds as hard as he could as Aspen and Crane began to do something that he knew that she had only ever done with him. It had to be a lie. She would have never done that. They were doing something to the video. She had only ever kissed one other man. Gale. That was it.

But he couldn't look away. He was forced to watch as the doctors shocked him, keeping his eyes open. There was no other option. He had to watch it. She place her hands on the front of his jacket and easily slid open the first two buttons. Like she had done it a thousand times before. Which she hadn't... She hadn't... Only with him. He knew that. Crane watched her closely the entire time as she opened the front of the jacket and gently pushed the piece of fabric from his body. They both smiled at each other.

She tilted herself up onto her toes to give him a kiss as the jacket slid off of his shoulders and to the floor. A pain worse than any he had felt while being in the Capitol shot through Cato as Crane grabbed her waist and brought her against him. She let out a soft giggle that Cato had heard so many times before as she started to slowly untuck the shirt from his pants. Her hands gently worked at the buttons as she undid them. It wasn't long before Crane grabbed her hair and pulled her back in for a lingering kiss.

She didn't fight back against him. She just smiled and wrapped her arms over his shoulders. Crane stepped back and allowed the shirt to fall off of his frame. She pulled back only long enough to smile at him before Crane pulled her back in for another heated kiss. Crane slipped the belt off of his pants and tossed it off to the side. He kicked off his shoes and motioned for her to do the same. She did so and took another step backwards. Cato grunted in intense mental pain.

Slowly she turned back as he placed a hand on her lower back, right where the scars from the wolf mutt had once been. The wolf that he had set after her. His hands traveled from her waist up to the middle of her back, right where the bra strap was. Cato fought back against the bindings painfully as she laughed softly. Just a second later he unhooked it. She playfully held it to her chest for a moment before Crane reached around and gently pulled it from her body, placing a small bite on her shoulder.

As Cato himself had done so many times before... Crane turned her back and gently put a hand on her chest, brushing over the skin. "Lovely," he said.

"Thank you. It's all yours," she said, stepping into him.

"Has he touched you?" Seneca asked, obviously referring to Cato.

"Not like this. And his touch will be nothing. Not compared to yours," she said.

Crane grabbed the back of her head and brought her into a lingering kiss. Crane gently walked them backwards towards the bed and separated the kiss. Then he turned her back away from himself. His hands went around her front, trailed down her body, and finally hit her at the hips. Right above where the band of her underwear was. Cato grunted in horror as Crane brushed the hair off of her shoulders and moved it in front of her chest. A second later he pressed a kiss to the back of her neck.

Just as he himself had done so many times to her. The way that he knew would make her shiver. Just as she was right now. Crane reached around her and grabbed her chin. He turned her head back to give him a kiss as his hands gently wandered down from her chin, to her throat, to her chest, to her stomach, to her waist, to her hips again. No... She hadn't done that... She wasn't about to do that. She hated Crane. That time he grabbed the band of the underwear that she was wearing.

Get off of my wife... He tried to force the words out of his throat, but it felt like his words were lumped in his throat. Crane released her head and gently pushed her to lean over the bed. Even he had never done that to her before. He had always wanted her to look at him. He wanted to see her. Look her in the eyes. As he slid them down her legs, she turned back to him and smiled. Once Crane had them down around her ankles, he turned her back to him and pulled her to step out of them.

"What a gorgeous creature you are," Crane said.

"Show me how gorgeous I am," she purred.

In a voice that even Cato had never heard. She would always laugh or edge in a teasing note. Never like that. Like the other girls from District 2... Crane grabbed Aspen's hands and she willingly placed them at his waist. She slowly took the button on his pants in between her fingers and popped it open, sliding the zipper down, and stepping back for him to remove his pants. He did so and gently threw them to the side. His underwear was the only thing that was now separating them.

Cato's stomach twisted into knots as he watched the screen. They weren't about to do that. They couldn't. She had only done that with him. Crane put an arm around her back and met her lips again. He brought a hand up to push her backwards. She lost her footing and they hit the bed as they collapsed onto it. Crane fell over her and pressed a lingering kiss against her throat. Just the way that he always did. Crane kissed the crook in between her neck and throat and dropped his hands to push her legs apart.

It was like watching the two of them together, back in the Capitol before the Games. But he could tell that it wasn't really Aspen. Her voice was too teasing and and cold. It wasn't her. He had never heard her like that before. Not even when he had been with her. Because they had always been loving. He just had to keep watching her. Watch her do something that was literally worse than all of the other torture that he had been through. Because that was his wife with a man that had tried to kill her.

He didn't understand how this was happening. He didn't understand when this had happened. It couldn't have happened. That was the only answer. Cato was forced to remain where he was, watching them as they wrapped around each other, just the way that she had been with him so many times before. Cato continuously jerked against the bonds, peeling off more skin and making himself bleed, trying so desperately not to watch. She didn't do that. There was no possible way that she could have done that.

But the cameras never stopped rolling. Nothing ever changed. He just kept watching. It was like they knew that he was watching them and they were deliberately elongating the process. So he just had to watch them together for what felt like days. His eyes were pried open by the doctors after he kept trying to squeeze them shut and the electrical shocks stopped working. So he just watched, his heart breaking more and more with each passing second, as they talked about how much she genuinely hated Cato.

Finally the screen changed. For a long time it had just been Aspen and Crane laying in bed together, talking and laughing, just the way that she had done with him so many times before. He hated having to see her like that with someone. Because he knew that it wasn't the truth. But there was something lingering in the back of his mind... The way that they were looking at each other... The way that she was laughing... It was the way that he had thought that she had only been with him.

Seeing the screen return to its blank state, Cato leaned back and let out a desperate breath. He had been praying for a long time that it would end. But his vision was fading in and out from having his eyes open so long. He spotted the screen fading back in and he let out a strangled breath. Because he was being brought back to his first time in the arena. But it wasn't a horrible memory. In some ways, it was. But in other ways, it was one of the happiest memories that he had.

He was in the cave with Aspen after the firestorm and the fight with the boy from District 9. It had been a horrible moment, the second that he had seen her laying in the grass with the blood all around her. But then he had realized that it wasn't her that was dead. She was just badly injured. That was the day he'd realized how much he loved her. This was something that would finally bring a happy memory. Cato was leaning over her leg and stitching up her thigh.

She had just woken up and they were chatting back and forth. He remembered her weak voice from remembering what she had done to the boy. They were teasing each other as he told her about the fact that she had pissed off the fireballs. Suddenly there was a terrible pain stabbing him in the pelvis. One of the pain simulators. It was just around the bottom of his intestines, right above somewhere very precious to him. Cato grunted in pain as Aspen smiled on screen and pressed a kiss against his lips.

"Smile for the cameras, love," Aspen whispered, leaning over him.

That was when he realized... She was stabbing him. Leaning over him to keep the knife out of sight of the cameras. "What are you doing?" Cato asked breathlessly. On the screen? A memory? What was it?

"Smile," Aspen prodded.

"Aspen..." Cato whispered desperately.

"Keep going," Aspen whispered, referring to their kiss. Cato was stunned. "Keep going or I keep moving it."

"Stop. What - What?" Cato breathed.

She hadn't done that... They had been together and she had been grateful for him saving her. "Don't be an idiot, Cato. People like you killed my parents. So I'm going to kill you. Smile for me, Cato. I do like your smile," she whispered in his ear.

Smile for her? What was she doing? He was in love with her. He knew that she was in love with him. Even back then, they had been completely in love. Already. She had never really hurt him. He had hurt her a number of times in the Games, something that had always bothered him, and he had been trying to make up to her since then. That was when he had realized that she was his redeeming quality. And she had kissed him. They had been happily together. She hadn't hurt him. She never did.

The scene on the screen shifted again. Or was it in his head? He still couldn't figure it out. Things were getting clearer, but these clear memories weren't memories that made sense. Now the screen was showing the two of them in the cave together towards the end of the Games. When they had their little bonding session. It brought back stirring memories and Cato growled deep in his throat. He was trying so desperately to thrash around to beat back the altered images of her. Because she hadn't done that...

There was no way that she could have done any of that. They were in love. Always had been. On the screen Aspen rolled him underneath her as she sat on his waist. Had she done that? Cato could barely remember. She bit down on his lip so roughly that he began to bleed. Even in the white room Cato could feel the pain. He hissed and tried to look away. But an electrical shock forced him to look straight back at her. Or whoever that was. Because it wasn't her...

Just seconds later he felt her nails piercing through the skin on his chest and stomach, spotting the little bloody prints on the screen. He was used to her piercing nails. He had felt them clawing down his back before. But that had always been in pleasure. Not this... pain. It was even more painful because it was her. He was moaning in pain - both on the screen and in real life - as her hands dug further and further underneath his skin. On the screen he was moaning into her mouth, which looked pleasurable.

The scene shifted again. Cato groaned, trying so desperately hard to look away. But he couldn't. Because they just kept forcing him to watch in horror at the woman who couldn't have really been Aspen. That time they were fighting the mutts off during the Death Match. He remembered it well, feeling her shaking against him. Aspen was panicked on the screen, standing back-to-back with him, before the scene shifted again. Slightly fuzzy. Aspen was now standing over him as her grin widened.

That wasn't real. They had run off together. Right? He watched as her blonde hair suddenly became a little fuzzier and puffed out around her throat. Suddenly she began to transform. Her nose elongated and her teeth became larger and sharper. She was transforming into the lion mutt right before his eyes. Cato screamed loudly on the screen and in real life as she bit down and tore the flesh straight out of his arm. Was she a mutt? No... He had been with her for a year. He would have noticed.

But it was becoming harder and harder to remember who she really was. Because he kept having to watch all of this. Cato was screaming bloody murder for hours. Because it never stopped. In every way she just continuously attempted to kill him. In the Games and after them. In all sorts of different ways. Laughing at him for thinking that she was actually in love with him. Calling him a fool and not in a joking manner. Staying with him physically, something even more torturous than the physical harming.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the images stopped appearing. Cato's head dropped back against the table as he stopped fighting. They were gone. And now tears were building in his eyes. What were they doing to him? He couldn't put two and two together. He knew that there was no way that she had done that. She wouldn't have done that. Because they were in love. She didn't do that... But where were his memories of her? His real memories? Like that night on the roof before the Games. That had happened. Hadn't it?

Suddenly he spotted the shadow of someone standing near him. He tried to jump away from the figure. Likely a doctor. But he was still bound to the table. That didn't matter. He wanted those doctors as far away as possible. Because they would only manage to continue hurting him. What the hell was happening? It was one of the doctors. What did they want now? But then he realized that it wasn't a doctor at all. It was Aspen... His wife... Looking happy and healthy. No lasting injuries from the arena.

"Hi," she chirped sweetly.

She was wearing a simple shirt and pair of jeans. She looked just as she had before the Quell. "Aspen..." Cato breathed out.

Was she really here? How? Why? She had to leave. "Long time no see," Aspen teased.

"You need to leave. They can't find you. Please leave," Cato begged.

No matter what he had just seen her do, that was still his wife. The love of his life. He needed her to be safe and that was far away from him. He could handle what they were doing to him. No matter how bad things became. The only thing that he couldn't tolerate was having her hurt. He couldn't listen to them do the same things to her that they had to him. He had seen her hurt enough and it was worse each time. That was the one thing that he couldn't handle.

"It's okay. They won't hurt me," she reassured him.

"They'll kill you. Aspen... Leave. Please," Cato begged.

"Hush. It's okay, Cato. I just wanted to see you," Aspen chirped.

Where had she even come from? That didn't matter. "What are they doing to me? What have they done to you?" Cato asked, remembering seeing her shifting forms into the wolf mutt that had torn out a chunk of his arm.

"They haven't done anything, Cato. They've just been showing you who I am," Aspen said, wiping off some sweat-soaked hair from his forehead. "You know who I am. Don't you?"

"Stop. Stop, please," Cato said, attempting to pull away from her.

"Just relax," Aspen whispered.

Cato started to thrash around as Aspen hooked her arms around the edge of the metal table. A second later she jumped up onto it. Cato cringed as she leaned up over him and sat over his waist. Cato cringed, remembering that the last time that he had seen her do just that, she had tried to kill him. She gently leaned down and pressed herself into him before leaning down and pressed a lingering kiss against his mouth. Cato tried to push her off. Something was wrong. That wasn't Aspen. She wasn't like this.

"Stop," Cato said, against her mouth.

Aspen's lips turned upwards into a smile. "You never fought back against me before," she breathed.

"This isn't you," Cato said.

She leaned up just long enough to undo her top few buttons. "Don't you want me?" Aspen asked, her voice holding a more teasing note than he had ever heard before.

"Always," Cato said, meaning every word. "But this isn't you. Get off of me. Get off!"

But she wouldn't. No matter how hard he tried to fight her off, she wouldn't. He couldn't have her like this right now. Not when he was in this state. Not when she was. Not when he couldn't figure out what was real and what wasn't. He couldn't have her when he couldn't even remember if she was in love with him. If she was really a mutt. She couldn't have been... He still remembered their agreement to come to the meadow together one day. That woman was so different than the one on top of him right now.

The Aspen that he knew would have snapped the restrains and taken him away from the Capitol without a second word. She wouldn't have even asked him if he was okay. She just would have moved. This Aspen was continuing to kiss him, trying so hard to get his resolve to crumble. Her hands started winding down his body to continue touching him. Her hands eventually wrapped around the paper cover that he was wearing to pry it off. Then her hands went to his bare skin to grip roughly at him.

Then her hands began to pull at his skin. Not just gently, like he was so used to, maybe leaving some red marks that disappeared by the morning. This time it was so rough that she started to rip it off in pieces. He tilted his head back, breaking off her kiss, before opened his mouth in a horrible scream. Something that didn't even sound human. Worse than the sounds that the Avoxes made. He was pleading with her to get off of him, to remember who he was, but she didn't release him and didn't move.

He was trying so hard to get her to loosen up her grip. She was the love of his life. She was what meant everything in the world to him. She was the one person that he was willing to give up everything for. She was his wife. So what was happening? Why was she with Seneca Crane? Why was she hurting him? Why was she doing all of this? What were they doing to him? This wasn't Aspen. It couldn't have been Aspen. But why was this the only way that he could remember her?

Eventually Cato lifted his head up, as Aspen was now simply sitting over him, to try and plead with her again. He could feel the blood coating him and the limp pieces of flesh hanging off of his skin. His vision was fuzzy. Maybe from blood loss? Or was it that strange sedative that they had been pumping through his veins? He couldn't figure it out. The only thing that he knew was that he desperately wanted to be back in the arena with her. Something that he had never thought that he would want.

But he missed that day in the jungle. Just before everything had gone to hell. The last time that he could remember her being... herself. But the moment that he lifted his head up, he realized that she wasn't at all who he thought that she was. She had changed appearances. Her eyes were glowing green. Her teeth were a few inches long and razor sharp. Her skin had been tinged a grayish-white and she had horrible scars all over her. And her sword-like nails were cutting him into pieces.

That was when it all started to make sense. Just her very appearance. Her chest was rumbling with cruel laughter. Laughter that didn't even sound like her. Because it wasn't her. It never had been. They had been doing something to him. The entire time. It wasn't Aspen who had been injured by the wolf mutt. It was him. And she had been the mutt who had torn him to pieces. Was she even a real person, or just something that the Capitol had made up during the first Games?

"What are you?" Cato asked breathlessly.

"I'm your wife, Cato," Aspen said, her voice deep and deadly.

"No... No... You aren't her," Cato said, breathing shallowly.

If Aspen ever had been real, this wasn't her. "Yes, I am. This is who I have always been. How you were stupid enough to buy that I ever loved you, I'll never know," she teased.

Just as she had since the screen had been placed in front of him. Something about her had changed. Because this wasn't really her. Maybe she never really had been Aspen Antaeus. Maybe all of his memories of her were fake. He couldn't figure it out. Aspen leaned forward and Cato let out a piercing scream. Because, just a moment later, her horrible teeth dug into his throat and tore it out. And that was only the beginning of the never-ending torture that he suffered at her hand.

Off on the other side of the room were the doctors. The doctors who had been working at Cato Hadley for a number of weeks. They had been watching him all day. They looked very interested to see what was happening. And they were. Because it had been a long time since the Capitol had used this procedure. They were watching Cato, as he was strapped to the table, screaming over pain that was only being simulated. They were watching his reactions, what he was seeing, on a monitor.

Hours after they had begun the procedure, President Snow entered the room. None of the other people in the room said anything. They simply allowed the President to stand and watch what was happening. He walked towards the edge of the one-way mirror and glanced in on the still screaming Cato. His voice was becoming hoarse as his sobs were now mostly dry. But he was still desperately thrashing against the restraints that were keeping him against the table.

"How is he?" President Snow finally asked.

"The venom is working. He is strong," the doctor said, earning an irritated glance from President Snow. "He still retains many unaltered memories of her. But he'll eventually lose those, too."

President Snow hummed. It would be a while before he was completely lost to her. "Good. His first interview with Caesar was just released to the Districts. Now that we know for a fact that Miss Antaeus is alive," President Snow said, remembering seeing her wandering District 12 on the security footage. "Soon enough we'll have to allow her to see what has become of her husband."

"He hasn't completely forgotten her," the doctor said.

"But he will?" President Snow asked.

"Soon enough. A few weeks from now and he'll have no memories of Aspen Antaeus that we haven't given him," the doctor said.

The corners of President Snow's mouth tilted upwards. "Good. Keep working at him," he ordered.

"Yes, sir."

It wouldn't be much longer. President Snow knew that. The games had just begun between himself and Miss Antaeus. And they were already destined to end soon enough. But only when the time was right. President Snow walked out of the room, feeling thrilled at the fact that Aspen Antaeus would be dead soon enough. No more empty promises. Because Cato Hadley, her own husband, would cause the ultimate betrayal. He would kill her himself.

Aspen's P.O.V.

Slowly I rocked back and forth against the wall. There was something almost hysterical in the way that I was feeling right now. Did I know what it was? No. I wished I did though. But this was a feeling that I had never experienced before. It wasn't happiness. It wasn't even elation. No. It was so much more than that. I had a feeling that I would never really know what it was. But it was wonderful. Better than I had experienced in a long time. Because Cato was alive. I knew for a fact that he was really alive.

My hands clasped over my mouth. I didn't want anyone to know where I was right now. I just wanted to be alone for a while. To think about what I knew now was the truth. A somewhat hysterical laugh escaped my mouth. It didn't stop for a long time. It just kept coming. Laugh after laugh after laugh. Because he was alive. He was actually still breathing. I couldn't want to have him touch me again. To sleep in the same bed with me again. I missed not having him sleep with me.

Think about what you know, Aspen. Play the game.

My name is Aspen Hadley. My husband's name is Cato Hadley. We were in the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games. We escaped together. We were also in the Seventy-Fifth Hunger Games. I was rescued by District 13. Cato was taken by the Capitol. I thought that he was dead. But he is alive and well. And I will get him back.

Things had been very tense not having him around. I hadn't been sleeping much lately. Not unless I was in the Morphling haze. Which I hadn't been for a while, having wanted to see the ruins of District 12. I had to see it and that meant to get off of it. But that made the nightmares worse. He was always one of the few people that could bring me down from my episodes without needing any type of medicine or sedation. He was the only person that could manage within seconds.

He was always one of the people who could help me get back to myself. Because it wasn't just the Games. Everything that had happened to me had been affecting me in so many ways. Because it was constantly looking over my shoulder and having difficulty trusting people. For so many more reasons than just the fact that they hadn't saved Cato. It was everything. It wasn't just something that I could walk away from. But Cato made it so much easier.

It also helped that he was one of the few people that could see one of my episodes coming from a mile away. He knew when the triggers were about to come. He knew his own and sometimes I got the feeling that he knew mine even better than he knew his own. The smell of the flowers. The looks that I would get from people. That unsettled feeling. Those horrible dreams. How people would speak to me. He knew that, no matter how hard I tried, I was unable to turn it off. And he had never cared.

He was one of the few people that understood that my nightmares when I was asleep were constantly bleeding into my daily life. At times after just getting up I was unable to differentiate whether I was awake or asleep. Cato had always understood that, because he experienced it, too. They felt so real, I even experienced the physical pain in them. That was the worst part. Even hearing someone call my name, sometimes I would scream and start rocking back and forth. Cato had always understood to softly call my name.

That was the worst part. That no one understood that it wasn't just at night. The nightmares were horrible, but it was the fact that they didn't even fade during the waking hours. It was a bunch of nightmares during the day. I would lose my grip on where I was, particularly being in District 13, and I would get lost in the memory. It was like I wasn't even where I actually was. It felt so real, and the next thing I would wake up and have no idea how I got to where I was.

Having whatever it was that affected me was horrible. Because it only added to my feelings of loneliness. Because, for me, it was like being apart from everyone else, finding fault with everyone that I met and walking a constant tightrope between fight or flight. The overwhelming feeling of guilt was hard to live with, and no one could convince me otherwise. It was truly terrible. But there was always hope and always a light that never went out. And Cato had always been my light.

There wasn't even a vague chance in hell that they would stop when Cato came back. I knew that much. I wasn't fool enough to think that the nightmares would ever go away. In sleep or during my waking hours. They would likely never end. Not for the rest of my life. But I had prepared myself for that a long time ago. I had known that well before setting foot in the arena the first time around. But at least it would get a little better with him being back with me.

How much time had passed? I wasn't sure. Probably an extremely long time. All I knew was that there were only a number of people who knew this hiding spot. And I also knew that it was time for me to get moving. To get ready for tomorrow. Because that would be when my plan would be enacted. So finally I managed to get to my feet and go back to the apartment, knowing that no one would bother me for a while. They would let me process what I had just seen.

They didn't want me to think about what had just happened. But I couldn't just not think about it. I had to think about how to fix this. And it started with thinking about what I wanted to do about Cato. How to save him and how to end this war. Despite wanting to be alone for a while, the door did eventually open. I glanced up to tell my family that I was okay, more than okay, when I realized that it wasn't them. It was Cato's family. All of them. They must have been waiting for me to come here.

"Hey," I greeted.

The smile on Alana's face was almost heartbreaking. "Hello, sweetheart. How are you?" Alana asked, walking over and taking a seat on my cot.

"I think the better question is, how are you? Your son is alive," I commented.

"So is your husband," Damien pointed out.

It was enough to make me smile again. "I'm better than I have been in a long time. He's alive. He's out there," I said breathlessly. "We just have to get up and get him back. We can do it. I know that we can."

"Of course. We're going to get him back," Damien said happily. His smile faded a moment later though. "There's only one problem."

"What's that?" I asked.

There was no problem. Cato was alive. Problem solved. "Coin isn't happy with what Cato's said in the interview. She believes that he might have done a lot of damage," Damien explained.

In a way she was right. Cato had very likely done some damage tonight. Because he had just tried to convince everyone to end the war. But it would depend on the Districts. Those in the outer-lying Districts would likely understand that he was being forced into saying it. They would be able to tell by the way that he reacted to the questions about me. The Capitol people weren't fighting anyways. It was the inner Districts, who we already had such a weak hold on, who would pose the problem.

"Anyone with a brain knows that Snow is telling him to say it. He's in danger there. Everyone knows that. He's only saying what he has to say to survive," I explained.
"Everyone knows that. Unfortunately, Cato is the kind of person who can put on a good front for the cameras. The people have always liked him. And his request sounds very reasonable. The resistance is already shaky with some of the Districts still wanting to quell the fight. This might make things worse," Damien said.

"So we do something to keep the flame burning," I said determinedly.

"That's good," Damien said.

They all knew what they wanted me to do. And I knew that I was going to do it. "He looked healthy," Alana commented.

"They've actually been taking care of him. But they won't forever. Eventually they'll try another tactic to hurt me. We have to go and get him," I said, knowing that it was only so long before they hurt him.

"There's no guarantee that they will," Alana said sadly.

She genuinely believed that they weren't going to get him. Maybe they wouldn't. But they would. I was determined for that. "Oh, no. I know the perfect way to get him back," I said brightly.

"We're very glad to hear that," Alana said, her voice cracking.

I leaned over and grabbed her hands. "I'll get him back. I swear that I will," I said.

"We never doubted that," Carrie said.

"Sometimes I did. I thought that he was dead already," I said, not feeling quite as guilty about saying it now that I knew that he was alive. "But he's alive. I told them in my last meeting with them that if they could show me proof that he was alive, I would fight. They've given it to me. Likely for that exact reason."

"So...?" Carrie trailed off, waiting for me to say it.

"Time to get off my ass," I said.

"We knew it," Carrie said brightly.

She jumped forward and gave me a crushing hug. I laughed as I felt her begin shaking. She was going to get her brother back. They were getting their son back. I was getting my husband back. We were all going to get something back. Because we all loved each other. Because we all loved him. Because each one of us was willing to do whatever it took to get him back. I noticed that even Aidan looked happy with me. Finally I was doing something right for him.

"How are you all?" I finally asked.

"Better than we've been in a long time," Alana said.

"Yes. I understand that," I said.

"I can't believe that he's still alive," Skye breathed.

Glancing over to her, I noticed that she was crying. Or she had been, at least. "I'm so sorry, Skye. I know that you two have been friends since you were children," I said. She gave me a slow nod. "I'm sorry for everything that I've put you through. Him through."

The entire Hadley family had been through far too much since I had stumbled into their lives. "If you asked him, he would tell you that it would all be worth it. Just for a year with you," Skye said, making my eyes water slightly. "We love you, Aspen. You're family now. His and ours. It's all worth it for him."

"I just wish that he had never had to go through all of that," I mumbled.

"Of course. We wish that, too. But it'll be okay. We're going to get him back and everything is going to go back to normal," Skye said brightly, happier than I had heard her in a long time.

"Once the war is over, at least," Julie interrupted.

"Yeah. Once the war is over. We're going to get up and fight and fix everything," I said.

Julie grinned and came to sit on my other side. "Strong words for someone who couldn't even bring herself to get out of bed a few weeks ago," she said, in a way that wasn't harsh.

She was just as strong-willed as I was. I was used to the way that she spoke. "Well I have a reason to fight now. Not just for him. For what Snow has done all of these years. For what he did to my home. Leah..." I trailed off.

The entire family glanced down at the ground. "You're tough, Aspen. That's one of the reasons that Cato always loved you. We know that you can do it. We believe in you," Julie said.

"Thanks, Julie," I said.

"Get him back, alright?" Julie asked, gripping my arm.

"Whatever it takes," I said truthfully.

Even if it meant my own life, I would get Cato back. "You're going to get him back?" Aidan asked.

It was the first time that he had spoken to me in a while, when it didn't look like he was angry with me. "I'll go if they'll let me. Whenever they let me," I said determinedly. Coin wouldn't like me going, but I didn't care. I had to save my husband. "But I'm going to get him back, one way or another."

"Good. I want him back. I miss him," Aidan said.

"I know. I miss him, too," I said.

"So you're really going to fight?" Aidan asked.

"I'm really going to fight. Do whatever it is that they need me to do. But I have some demands first. Ones that will guarantee that everyone survives this. Except Snow, of course," I said, as a last minute thought.

Alana's voice distracted me from Aidan. "This is..."

She trailed off and I glanced over to see what she was looking at. She was sitting at the edge of my bed that had my bedside table and everything that my family had managed to bring. The pictures, the medicine, and the paper. Now Alana and the rest of the family was looking over them. Alana smiled at the picture of Cato and I at the first party with our first kiss before grabbing something. The pearl... She had the pearl in her hands as she slowly turned it over. It was one of the few things I got to keep.

"Yeah. From the arena. One of the few things that I managed to keep," I whispered.

"You kept it," Alana said, holding the pearl almost possessively.

She clearly missed Cato just as much as I did. Just in a different way. "He gave it to me. Just in case it was one of the few things that I would ever get from him, I had to keep it," I said weakly.

"We remember that night," Alana muttered.

Marley was sitting in Carrie's arms. She glanced at the pearl and smiled. "Pretty," Marley chirped.

"D - Do you want it?" I stuttered.

Thankfully the rest of the family sensed that I wasn't even close to being ready to give up the pearl. Julie stepped in and took the pearl. "No, Aspen. Keep it. Until he's back," Julie said softly.

"Soon. He's going to be back soon," Carrie consoled, putting her hand on my shoulder.

"I know," I said happily.

"You know that this means that we're going to fight?" Dean asked.

Now that caught me off guard. "What?" I asked.

"All of us," Dean said, motioning around to the rest of the family. "We're going to start fighting. The condition was that we got to go out into the field when the Mockingjay did. That was when Thirteen would really join the fight."

"Really?" I asked, surprised.

"Really. We'll be right out there with you," Dean said.

But something didn't sit quite right with me. The entire family couldn't be fighting in the war. It was too dangerous. Alana was strong but she was older by now. And apparently she had never been that marvelous with weapons. Damien was older too, he was slowing down these days. Carrie had her daughter to take care of. Marley and Aidan were too young to fight. That left Dean, Skye, and Julie, who I wasn't sure if they were ready to fight.

"Who?" I asked carefully.

"Me," Dean said.

"Us, too," Skye added.

"Both of you?" I asked, referring to her and Julie.

"Yes. We've been training since we've been here. When it's time to get out on the front lines, we're all going to be there," Julie said, motioning to the three of them.

As much as I loved that they were willing to fight, I didn't want them to get hurt. "It's - It's not safe," I stuttered.

"We know that it's not safe. And that's what happens in war. We're okay, Aspen. We know what we're risking. But this is about so much more than just you and Cato. This is about the Capitol and all of the horrible things that they've done. If we have to give our lives to see their reign end, we will," Dean said determinedly.

"Do me a favor? Enough people have died. Don't follow in their footsteps," I said.

Cato had already lost his sister. How would he manage to cope with even more of his family dead? "Not unless we have to. But if we need to, we will," Skye said.

It was the Academy training in her. "We believe in this. We believe in you," Julie said.

"And so does Cato. No matter what he's saying, he wants this fight because of what they've done to you. To both of you," Carrie said.

"Everyone here is ready for this fight. So is Cato," Damien said.

"You can do it, Aspen. We know that you can," Alana said.

It seemed that more and more people were believing in me all the time. "Thank you," I whispered.

"We don't say anything that we don't believe," Damien said.

"You know, I always thought that you didn't like me," I admitted.

It was a question that had always bothered me. I couldn't tell if Damien liked me or not. "We weren't sure what to think about you at first. But you've become family, Aspen. Cato loves you. Still loves you. Always will love you. We love you. We love Cato. We're with you. We always will be," Damien said faithfully.

So it turned out that he did like me. They all did. "And I love you all, too. It took a long time for me to realize that you're all family. You are my family. And I will protect you. Just the way that I will protect Cato," I said fiercely.

They all grinned. "You look happy," Carrie said.

"For the first time in a long time, I am happy," I said.

"We are, too," Alana said.

"We're going to be together again. All of us," Dean said.

"Yeah," I whispered.

The day that he got back here would be one of the happiest days of my entire life. At least, the day that he got to see District 13 for the first time. I knew that he would be extremely confused and probably a little nervous, but he would figure it out. We would figure the entire thing out. We would figure everything out. Together. That was the only thing that mattered. It was just that the two of us would be together again. That was the important thing.

We sat together and chatted back and forth for a long time before the door opened. I glanced over to see my family but again it wasn't my family. This time it was someone else even more surprising. This time it was Seneca Crane who came in. I was definitely surprised to see him. I hadn't seen him in a long time when it was just the two of us. In fact, the last time that we had been completely alone together was the night that I arrived in the Capitol for the Quell.

"Seneca," I greeted.

"Might I have a word?" Seneca asked, glancing at the rest of the Hadley family.

"Of course," I said, giving them a guilty look.

"We'll leave you two be," Alana said, taking the hint.

The entire family turned to leave. They were halfway to the door when I called them back. "Hang on! In the morning. I'm making my demands in the morning," I explained.

I could see the relief in their faces. "Good. That's good. We're glad to hear that," Damien said.

"Get a good night's sleep. We're going to have some long days ahead of us," Carrie advised.

"I think this might be the first night in a long time that I get a decent night's sleep," I said honestly.

Which was perfect. Maybe I would dream of Cato tonight. A nice dream. Where he was alive and healthy. Something that I hadn't dreamed about in a long time. The entire Hadley family smiled and hugged me as they said goodnight. Tomorrow I would finally be the Mockingjay and they would be able to fight alongside me. It was the first time in a long time that I couldn't stop smiling. Because he was alive. I was going to get my husband back. The doors slid shut and I was left alone with Seneca.

He took a seat on my bed, maintaining a good bit of distance. "I haven't seen you smile like that in a long time," Seneca finally said, breaking the silence.

"Let's face it. I haven't had a reason to smile like this in a long time," I said.

"That is true," Seneca said.

"Still like my smile, huh?"

"I've always liked your smile." Seneca and I stared at each other blankly for a moment before he reached over and grabbed my hand. For once I didn't pull away. "I genuinely am sorry, Aspen. For everything," Seneca muttered.

"I know that, Seneca. Honestly, I do know that," I responded.

"You do?" Seneca asked, surprised.

"Yes. And I know that you have a potential to be a good man. It was just the way that you were raised," I said honestly.

It was something that I honestly believed about most of the Capitol people. "In the back of my mind, I always knew that it was the wrong thing to do. I always knew that it wasn't fair to kill little children. But I knew that everyone worked to be a Gamemaker. And a Head Gamemaker. So that was what my goal was. To become the Head Gamemaker," Seneca explained.

So he did have some semblance of a conscience. Even when he was younger. "And you got what you wanted," I said slowly.

"After a while I became numb to it. The deaths and the crying. Everything. It became a game. As shameful as that is," Seneca admitted, his face turning a little red. He was bashful about it. "The Capitol doesn't look at them like children. They look at them like -"

"Toys," I interrupted. "I know."

"I have no way to justify what I've done. What they do. But they aren't all evil," Seneca said.

"They have the capability to change. I know that much."

"You do?"

"Yes."

"Why is that?"

It was a good question. How did I know that the Capitol people could change? Because every one of them that I knew loved the Games. But they had learned to love Cato and I more than the Games. Clio had told me that and I had seen it. They couldn't stand me being in the Games because they had thought that I had an unborn baby with me. We had some Capitol rebels here themselves. People who knew that the Capitol was wrong. Plutarch was here. But there was one reason above all others.

"Because you changed," I finally answered.

"Yes. I did," Seneca said slowly.

"Why did you change?" I asked curiously.

"I met you," Seneca said quickly. Exactly the same reason that Cato had changed. Apparently I had something in me that made people change. "I knew right off of the bat that something was different. I lost my mother right around the time that your first Games started. It was much harder than losing my father. Then I learned who you were. Someone who had lost both her mother and father to the Games. Someone who lost her parents before she could even remember them.

"And I thought about what a nightmare that would have been. I couldn't have imagined growing up without my parents at my sides. I remembered how much I loved them, even when we would fight. I always loved them. But there was nothing that I could do for you. The Games were on. They were mine. And so were you. The more I watched you, the more that I liked you. The more you interested me. You kept talking and kept doing things that showed me just what a horrible thing that the Games really were.

"Even throwing the knife at me fascinated me. Because I realized just how angry you were with me. I realized just how much I hated what I was doing to you. Because you were heartbreaking. Seeing how upset you were about everything. Seeing how much you were hurt by these Games. I didn't want to send anything after you. But I had to. Because Snow was already suspicious of me. He had spoken to me a number of times about you. He hated you and I knew that I needed to make it look like I did, too.

"So I had to make things harder for you during the Games. It was the only way to keep myself safe. To keep Snow from doing something to you himself. But I sent things that I genuinely believed that you could beat. I tried to keep you alive. And you stayed alive. But I remember seeing the horrible things that kept affecting you. I remember seeing you with Rue. That was when I knew that I couldn't keep hurting you. I wanted you alive. I wanted to help you."

My heart was racing quickly. "That was when Cato genuinely fell in love with me," I whispered.

"I think that he was in love with you long before that," Seneca said.

"Maybe. Maybe not," I said, shrugging. "But he's in love with me now."

"Yes. He is," Seneca said.

"And you, Seneca?" I asked.

"What about me?"

Now came another question that I needed to know the answer to. "You and I have been so strange for so long. We're not really friends. We're barely allies. But I trust you," I admitted, as much as it bothered me. "For whatever reason, even after everything that we have done to each other, I trust you."
"Good. I want you to trust me. We are friends, Aspen. Believe it or not. I feel guilty for so many things that I have done to you. For that night. I am truly sorry," Seneca said slowly.

"Are you?" I asked disbelievingly.

"Yes. It's why I'm here now. For you," Seneca said.

"Not for all of this?" I asked bitterly.

"For that, too. I've never really liked President Snow before. It just took you to show me what a true monster he was," Seneca explained.

"If I wasn't around, you would be dead," I commented.

"My life would have never been threatened in the first place," Seneca said, somewhere in between bitter and amused.

"Don't bet on that. Katniss and I aren't that different," I explained.

"Perhaps. I am genuinely sorry about that night. I never intend to touch you again," Seneca said, shifting another inch or so away from me.

"Why?" I asked curiously.

There was a time that he had wanted me so much that he was willing to do anything to be with me. "Because I saw how much I hurt you. Because I saw how much you genuinely do love Cato," Seneca said. His words didn't quite process. "You would be willing to do something like that for him."

"I would do anything for him," I said quickly.

"I believe that. You go to the end of the world for those you love," Seneca said.

"That is true."

"It's a good, albeit dangerous, personality trait to have."

We sat in silence for a moment before I turned to him. "What am I to you, Seneca?" I finally asked.

Seneca glanced back at me, the two of us locking eyes, neither one speaking. "What do you want me to be?" he finally managed to spit out.

What did I want him to be? Not a Gamemaker? Not even an ally. Those weren't real. "A friend. I would like for us to try and be friends. Really be friends. Not whatever we've been for so long," I said.

Seneca smiled weakly. "I would like for us to be friends, too," he said.

"Tell me something about you. Something that a friend would know," I said.

It was a game that I had played with Cato a number of times. "What do friends know?" Seneca asked.

What did I want to know? Nothing about the Games or about the war or about the Capitol. Something simple. Like my game. Start with the simple things and work my way up. "I don't know how old you are," I said.

"I'm thirty-four," Seneca said.

He was older than I had thought he was. "Old man, huh?" I teased. Seneca smiled and laughed softly, with a smile that didn't quite look like the old ones that he had given me. Like at the Training Center before the first Games. "I don't think I've ever heard you genuinely laugh like that. And I've never seen that smile."

"Perhaps you bring out a different side of me," Seneca said.

"Perhaps," I said, smiling bashfully. "Tell me something else."

"I'm allergic to shellfish," Seneca said.

There was another surprising revelation. "Really?" I asked.

"Really."

"I hated the oysters in the arena," I said, giving him a pointed glare. "They were awful. They're slimy and kind of slide down your throat."

"I saw you eating them once in the Capitol. You looked disgusted."

"I was."

"Now you tell me something," Seneca prompted.

"What do you want to know?" I asked.
"What's your favorite color?" Seneca asked.

The same thing that Cato and I had once asked each other. His was blue. "Green," I answered softly.

We smiled at each other as Seneca turned his gaze to the side. His eyes locked onto something that was sitting on the side table. "That was when everyone knew." Seneca was looking at the photograph of Cato and I locked in a kiss after the wildfire. "They knew that you two were really in love," Seneca said.

"That was the kiss that made me know. I knew that I really did love him. No matter how much I tried to deny it. Even though I never really knew love," I muttered the last part.

Seneca reached over and grabbed my hand. A gesture that had once terrified me but now was somewhat comforting. "Don't let Snow think that's the truth. You do know love. From everyone in District 12. From your family. From Cato's. And from a number of other people. Including your parents, believe it or not," Seneca said.

"Have you seen District 12?" I asked suddenly.

"No. Not yet. I'm very sorry about District 12. About your home. I wasn't aware that it would happen," Seneca said.

"But you knew that something would happen."

"I had a feeling. I warned as many people as I could."

"I know. And thank you for that."

A brief silence passed. When Seneca looked back at me, he had a strange look on his face. "The child was officially just a ruse, correct?" Seneca asked.

"Yes. Of course," I said.

"We are friends, Aspen. Correct?" Seneca asked.

"I think so," I said slowly. "Why?"

Of course it was just a ruse about the child. I would have thought that he had been one of the first people who had been told about the fake pregnancy. The two of us sat in another brief silence as I stared at Seneca, wondering what the hell he wanted to say. I didn't understand where that comment had come from. Something about the child... Was he going to ask me if I wanted to have a child? I never had before. Now the question was up in the air. Maybe after the war. Far in the future.

Seneca seemed to be waiting for me to say something. But I couldn't figure anything out. I couldn't figure out what I was supposed to say to his comment. Even a few minutes later we were still sitting together in silence. Clearly I had to make the first move. After a while, the door opened and someone slipped in. I glanced up confusedly. Gale slid into the room and sat down beside me, his nose trickling with blood. He gave Seneca a nasty look.

"I'll be going," Seneca said, taking the hint. "Do you need a medical team?"

"I'm fine. Thanks," Gale said begrudgingly.

He would always hate Seneca for the Games. "I'll leave the two of you be. Goodbye, Aspen. Mr. Hawthorne," Seneca said, getting up and heading to the door.

"See you around, Seneca. Wait," I called back as he made it to the door. "What did you want to say?"

Seneca shook his head. "Another time, perhaps. Tomorrow will be your announcement, I suppose?" Seneca asked.

"Yes. Good guess," I teased.

"Then I'll see you tomorrow," Seneca said.

Once he was gone, I turned over to where Gale was now sitting, looking very peeved about something. "What happened?" I asked, spotting how bad the bloody nose was.

"I got in Boggs's way," Gale answered with a shrug. I used my sleeve to wipe his nose. "Watch it!"

"Quit whining," I snapped.

After everything that I had been through, I wasn't very sensitive to other people's pain when it wasn't life-threatening. But Gale was my best friend so I tried to be gentler. Patting, not wiping. He was still twitching slightly with each touch. I could tell that he was in a lot of pain. He must have gotten hit pretty hard by someone. I knew how that felt. I remembered when Cato had broken my nose. On accident, at least. But it had still hurt. Maybe one day I would pay him back for it.

"Don't be a bitch," Gale snapped.

"Too late. Stop whining," I barked. "It's not broken. You're just sore."
"Damn it," Gale hissed.

"Boggs was in there?" I asked.

"You didn't see him?" Gale asked. I shook my head. "He was right there. He was the one who tried to stop you." He pushed my hand away. "Quit! You'll bleed me to death."

"You're a pain in the ass. I'm trying to help you!" I shouted.

"You're not a healer," Gale said.

"Then I'll collect Prim and get her to give you a hand," I groaned.

"I'm fine. Knock it off," Gale said.

There was no way that I was just going to leave him alone. The blood was very heavy. He wouldn't bleed out but he would definitely start getting light-headed soon enough. He needed to get some food and water in him, and then he needed something to stem the blood. More than I could do. Then he needed to see if it needed to be reset. The trickle by now had turned to a steady stream. So I gave up on the first-aid attempts.

"You fought with Boggs?" I asked.

"No, just blocked the doorway when he tried to follow you. His elbow caught me in the nose," Gale said.

"You didn't have to do that," I said.

"I knew that you needed to be alone for a while. To process everything," Gale explained.

"Thanks for that."

"But apparently you weren't alone," Gale said, scowling at the door.

He still hated Seneca as much as he always had. Maybe even more now. "Cato's family came by first. I had to talk to them. They just found out that their son and brother is still alive," I said quickly, noting the way that Gale started scowling again. "And then Seneca came by to check on me."

"That's nice of him," Gale growled.

Sensing that I should change subjects, I leaned back on the bed and turned to him. "They'll probably punish you," I said.

"Already have." He held up his wrist. I stared at it uncomprehendingly. "Coin took back my communicuff," Gale explained.

I bit my lip, trying to remain serious. But it seemed so ridiculous. "I'm sorry, Soldier Gale Hawthorne," I said.

"Don't be, Soldier Aspen Antaeus." He grinned. So did I. He was one of the few people that could still manage it. "I felt like a jerk walking around with it anyway." We both started laughing. "I think it was quite a demotion."

"Very demeaning. You're just a normal person now. Just like me," I said.

"You're nowhere near normal," Gale said, making me laugh.

That was one of the few good things about Thirteen. Getting Gale back. With the pressure of my marriage and relocating to District 2 between Cato and me gone, we had managed to regain our friendship. He didn't push it any further - try to kiss me or talk about love. Either I had been too sick, or he was willing to give me space, or he had learned where my heart laid, or he knew that it was just too cruel with Cato in the hands of the Capitol. Whatever the case, I had someone to tell my secrets to again.

Of course there was Katniss. But she was very distraught about everything. Gale was stronger than the both of us. "We all saw those letters that you wrote," Gale said eventually, breaking the silence.

My face drained of color. I didn't know that they had read them. "I told you to read them after I was gone," I snapped.
"We knew that there was a good chance that we were going to have to leave after the end of the Games. So we read the letters beforehand," Gale said.

So that meant that he had read what I had told him. About how much I loved him and always would. About my torn heart. That must have been why he had been nicer to me lately. And Prim knew the truth about the wedding. But she also knew that I did love him. Ms. Everdeen... Oh, no... She knew that Cato and I had slept together. At least she hadn't said anything yet. She would eventually. And Katniss, she must have known about Seneca and I being together. Not good.

"Right. Well..." I trailed off awkwardly, spotting Gale's stare. "I'm not taking back what I said in my letter."

"Do you even remember what you wrote to me in the letter?" Gale asked.

"Vaguely," I muttered.

"You said that you weren't sure what you wanted to tell me. That there were lots of things that I wanted to hear you say. You said that you loved me and that you always would," Gale said.

"That's still true," I agreed.

"I know," Gale said, making me scowl at him. "And you said that you meant it every single time that you told me. You said it was the one thing that you had never lied to me about."

"That's also true," I said.

"Apparently I was the person who got you through the arena," Gale continued.

A small smile turned up on the corner of my lips. "I used to hear you speaking to me. I think it was a way of getting over being alone all the time. You were telling me that my traps wouldn't work because I was always so bad at camouflaging them," I said, giggling at the memory.

"Well that's definitely true," Gale said.

We both laughed as Gale looped an arm over my shoulder. "I managed alright, though," I finally muttered.

"Yeah. You did," Gale said.

"As for the rest of the letter?" I asked.

"Do you really want me to say it?" Gale asked.

Did I want to talk about it? No. I was never one for having conversations like that. I didn't like them. "No. But we'll have to talk about it at some point or another," I admitted.

Gale nodded slowly. "Not today. Not the day that you found out that your husband is still alive. You still wear your wedding ring," Gale said. I nodded, glancing down and spotting the shimmering diamond on my right ring finger. "You still have his around the necklace that he gave you."

His locket was sitting right on the bedside table with the ring looped around the chain. "I guess I do," I said. "What about the last part?"

Gale shook his head, breathing out a little laugh. "So you remember that part, at least?" Gale asked.

"Come on, Gale," I prodded.

The one thing that I did want to talk about was Gale and Katniss. They had been growing closer lately. "We'll talk about it later," Gale said, ignoring my wishes.

"Why not now?" I asked.

"You know why, Aspen," Gale said sharply.

Suddenly my teasing comments were gone. I didn't have anything to say back to that. Because I did know why. I knew exactly why. Because Gale needed to know what was happening between the two of us before he would ever finally be able to manage to move on. He would have to know what was going on between Cato and me before he could think about what was happening with Katniss. Because I was always his first choice. For a long time, I had been his only choice.

The thought broke my heart. I had almost forgotten about the way that Gale had thought about me. Because we had gone back to being such good friends. I would always love Cato. Especially now that I knew that he was alive. y husband was back. I didn't need to move on. Gale would never want to. Because Gale would always be standing there with me. No matter what. I kept breaking his heart over and over and over. I likely always would, as much as I genuinely hated the thought.

After a long silence, Gale spoke up again. "You know I saw Katniss's letter, too," he said.

Every thought that had been shooting through my head about Gale and Cato went out the window. My heart had practically stopped at his words. I couldn't believe that he had said that. I couldn't believe that Katniss had showed him. I was going to kill her. The point of the letters was just for their recipient to read them. Gale wasn't just giving me that look because he had been a Gamemaker. It was because he knew everything that had happened between the two of us.

"We're going to have to have a conversation about listening to directions," I said.

"Aspen -"

"Did you see the others?" I asked, thinking of what was in Ms. Everdeen's.

"No," Gale said. "Just the one you wrote Katniss."

A breath of relief escaped me. "Okay," I muttered.

"Just okay?" Gale asked.

"What else do you want me to say, Gale?"

"Are you joking? You're letting him walk around here? After everything that he's done to you?" Gale asked. I shrugged my shoulders. "You're speaking with him in private!"

"Believe it or not, Gale, I was aware that we were speaking in private," I said.

"Aspen," Gale warned.

"I told her not to tell anyone. Because I knew that it would hurt you all."

"It's only the two of us."

"Well I wanted it to only be the one of you."

"Well now I know, too. What are you doing even speaking to him?"

That was a very long explanation and I didn't have much of a good one for it. "Trying to get over it. Trying to accept his apology and realize that he's spent the last few months trying to make it up to me. Gale, you weren't there. You don't understand what's happening," I said, knowing that he wouldn't appreciate my apology.

"He attacked you, Aspen," Gale said.

"He knew what was coming. He was drunk. And he apologized for it. It's fine, Gale. It's over," I tried to insist.

"It's not okay to have him here," Gale warned.

"He's on our side now. I'm still not okay with what he did. I don't think I'll ever be completely okay with what he did," I said quickly. And I wouldn't. But maybe it was time to try and move on. "But it's over. And I genuinely believe that he'll spend the rest of his life trying to make that up to me."

Gale's eyes narrowed. "Then you're even more naive than I thought that you were," he barked.

"Thanks," I snapped.

"He kissed you? Brought you into his bed when you were engaged to Cato?" Gale growled.

"Yes. They don't learn what's right and wrong in the Capitol. There is nothing like that. Everything is right for them. But I believe that people can learn. They can change. They can become what you think that they can be. Obviously Plutarch did, at some point. There are other Capitol refugees here," I explained.

"You think that just because Cato changed, Crane can, too," Gale said.

"Snow threatening his death changed him. Seeing me... the way that I was that night changed him," I said.

He didn't need to know just how close I had been to having that taken from me. None of them did. "Gave him some semblance of a conscience?" Gale asked.

"Funny," I snapped. "He tipped me off that something would be happening that night in the arena. He gave me the tracker that got them to pick me up."

"I already knew that," Gale said.

"I was having a good day. A rare one. Can we just... be?" I asked desperately.

Gale was still one of my best friends. I didn't want to have to keep dealing with this. "I miss that day on the hill. Before the first Games," Gale said dreamily.

"Yeah. I do, too, sometimes," I muttered.

"Sometimes?" Gale asked.

"Gale," I warned.

He knew why I didn't always miss it. "Fine. Fine," Gale conceded.

"Come on, big guy. Wanna be my pillow like you used to?" I teased.

Gale scowled at me but eventually nodded. "What the hell? Sure," he said.

It was enough to make me smile. It had been a long time since he had let me do something like that. Gale leaned back on the bed to lay down. Just the way that we had when we were kids. I pushed myself onto his arm and rested against him. Cato was alive. That thought kept running through my head. He was alive and looking well. And we were going to get him back. It would be easy enough. I was going to be the Mockingjay and come back stronger than ever before.

Just a moment later the door opened. We both glanced up but didn't bother moving from our spots. Katniss had seen us like this a thousand times before. And she normally joined us. Katniss walked in and I raised my head long enough to smile at her. She looked happy to see us like that. I smiled softly as she seated herself next to me. A second later her head was on my stomach. Just the way as we had done a thousand times before. Curled up in bed together, old friends, as always.

"I know you showed him that letter," I told her.

"Oh," Katniss muttered.

"Yeah. Oh," I agreed.

"Aspen -"

"It's not a big deal," I cut her off. "It's no big deal. You did what you did. It's fine. You both saw the letter."

"We should talk about it," Katniss said.

That was the last thing that I wanted to talk about. "No. We can talk some other time about it. Not right now. Alright? I'm not in the mood to talk about it right now. I've had the first good day today that I've had in a long time," I reasoned.

Katniss let out a little breath but nodded anyways. "But we will talk about it," Katniss said determinedly.

"Sure. And next time, do what I say," I barked.

"Alright. Here. Picked this up on the way," Katniss said, tossing a gauze roll to Gale.

"Thanks," Gale said.

Another beat passed as Gale patched himself up. "Who are these people?" I asked.

"They're us. If we'd had nukes instead of a few lumps of coal," Gale answered.

"I like to think Twelve wouldn't have abandoned the rest of the rebels back in the Dark Days," I said.

"That's just because we like to think that everyone in District 12 is stronger," Katniss said.

"We might have. If it was that, surrender, or start a nuclear war. In a way, it's remarkable they survived at all," Gale said.

Maybe it was because I still had the ashes of my own District on my shoes, but for the first time, I gave the people of Thirteen something I had withheld from them: credit. Something that I really didn't want to admit. But they did deserve some credit. For staying alive against all odds. Their early years must have been terrible, huddled in the chambers beneath the ground after their city was bombed to dust. I knew because it was how I felt right now. But I couldn't even linger in the ashes of my District.

Population decimated, no possible ally to turn to for aid. Over the past seventy-five years, they had learned to be self-sufficient, turned their citizens into an army, and built a new society with no help from anyone. They would be even more powerful if that pox epidemic hadn't flattened their birthrate and made them so desperate for a new gene pool and breeders. Maybe they were militaristic, overly programmed, and somewhat lacking in a sense of humor. They were here. And willing to take on the Capitol.

"Still, it took them long enough to show up," I said.
"They could have done something," Katniss growled.

"It wasn't simple. They had to build up a rebel base in the Capitol, get some sort of underground organized in the Districts. Then they needed someone to set the whole thing in motion. They needed you," Gale said.

"They needed Cato, too, but they seem to have forgotten that," I snapped.

Gale's expression darkened. "Cato might have done a lot of damage tonight. Most of the rebels will dismiss what he said immediately, of course. But there are Districts where the resistance is shakier. The cease-fire's clearly President Snow's idea. But it seems so reasonable coming out of Cato's mouth," Gale explained.

"Now there's something that I bet that you never thought that you would say," I said, attempting a joke.

"No. It isn't," Gale said.

I was afraid of Gale's answer, but I asked anyway. "Why do you think he said it?"

"He might have been tortured. Or persuaded. My guess is he made some kind of deal to protect you. He'd put forth the idea of the cease-fire if Snow let him present you as a confused pregnant girl who had no idea what was going on when she was taken prisoner by the rebels. This way, if the Districts lose, there's still a chance of leniency for you. If you play it right." I must have still looked perplexed because Gale delivered the next line very slowly. "Aspen... he's still trying to keep you alive."

Idiot. Of course he is. How could I have thought that he wasn't still playing? "He's still playing the game," I muttered.

"As he always has been. Because he loves you," Katniss said.

"You think they'll keep him healthy?" I asked.

"I think that he doesn't care if they break each one of the bones in his body," Gale said.

"Gale," Katniss snapped.

"He'll do anything to keep you alive," Gale said.

To keep me alive? And then I understood completely. The Games were still on. We had left the arena, but since Cato and I weren't killed, his last wish to preserve my life still stood. His idea was to have me lie low, remain safe and imprisoned, while the war played out. Then neither side would really have cause to kill me. And Cato? If the rebels won, it would be disastrous for him. If the Capitol won, who knew? Maybe we would both be allowed to live - if I played it right - to watch the Games go on...

Images flashed through my mind: the spear piercing Rue's body in the arena, Peeta being torn to pieces by the muttations, Gale hanging senseless from the whipping post, the corpse-littered wasteland of my home. And for what? For what? As my blood turned hot, I remembered other things. My first glimpse of an uprising in District 8. The Victors locked hand in hand the night before the Quarter Quell. And how it was no accident, my shooting that arrow into the force field in the arena.

How badly I wanted it to lodge deep in the heart of my enemy. It would have been so easy. If I could have gotten my hands on an arrow before the Games. I could have gone to Snow the night of my wedding, hidden it under the large skirt, and sent it straight into his eye. I could have saved myself so much trouble. I would have been killed and Cato would have gotten his happy life. Just a second later I sprang up, upsetting a box of a hundred pencils sitting above the bed, sending them scattering around the floor.

"Aspen!" Katniss barked.

"What is it?" Gale asked.

"There can't be a cease-fire," I said determinedly. I leaned down, fumbling as I shoved the sticks of dark gray graphite back into the box. "We can't go back."

"I know," Gale said.

For everything that we had been through, each and every one of us, I couldn't let things go back... Prim being Reaped shot through my head. Rue begging for a volunteer. All of those dead kids. My final stand in the Death Match. My heartbreak at the Quarter Quell. The Victors banding together, giving their own lives, to save Cato and me. Me, mostly. Watching all of those people stand up to fight. Gale swept up a handful of pencils and tapped them on the floor into perfect alignment.

"Whatever reason Cato had for saying those things, he's wrong," I said.

"He's just saying what he has to so that he can stay alive long enough to protect you," Katniss said.

"It doesn't matter. He's wrong. Snow is wrong. He must have forced him," I said determinedly.

Katniss wrapped an arm over my shoulder. "Of course. Everyone knows that he wouldn't do anything to hurt you. And stopping the war would be one surefire way to hurt you," Katniss reasoned.

They were both right. Hurting Cato, stopping the war before it really got underway, and destroying District 12 were all things that President Snow had done to try and hurt me. And he had managed to hurt me. But I didn't care. Because I was going to stand up and end things with him. This war was going to get started and I wasn't going to stop until he was dead and Cato was back here. The stupid sticks wouldn't go in the box and I snapped several in my frustration.

"We know. Give it here. You're breaking them to bits," Gale said.

He pulled the box from my hands and refilled it with swift, concise motions. "He doesn't know what they did to Twelve. He doesn't know what they did to Two. He doesn't know about Leah. If he could have seen her body or what was on the ground -" I started.

"Aspen, I'm not arguing. If I could hit a button and kill every living soul working for the Capitol, I would do it. Without hesitation," Gale said. He slid the last pencil into the box and flipped the lid closed. "The question is, what are you going to do?"

It turned out the question that had been eating away at me had only ever had one possible answer. There was always one answer. The one that I had been bouncing back and forth between for so long. The one answer that I had never been able to truly put together. Because I had been too afraid to say it. Because I had felt too weak. But now I knew the truth. It was strong enough to do it. The whole thing just took Cato's ploy for me to recognize it.

What am I going to do?

If there was one thing that Cato had ever given me, it was the gift of strength. I had always been strong. I knew that much. Surviving starvation in District 12, managing myself all those years without parents, and volunteering for Prim. Living through the Games once and dealing with the aftermath. But Cato had given me true strength. It had just taken me this long to realize it. Because sometimes I had to get knocked down lower than I ever had, just to stand up taller than I ever was.

For so long I had known the one true reason that I was alive. They had made it obvious enough. I had known exactly what I was supposed to do. But I had just been so afraid. I had forgotten my strength. The strength that Cato had once given me. Now that he was back, so was my strength. I took a deep breath. My arms raised slightly - as if recalling the black-and-white wings Cinna gave me the night of the Interviews - then came to rest at my sides. Gale and Katniss were staring at me.

"What I should have done a long time ago. I'm going to be the Mockingjay."

Chapter 4: Chapter Four

Buttercup's eyes reflected the faint glow of the safety light over the door as he laid in the crook of Prim's arm, back on the job, protecting her from the night. It was enough to make me smile. It had been a long time since I had seen something like that. She was such a sweet kid. Sometimes I forgot that she was still just a little kid. Right now she reminded me that she was. She was just thirteen years old. Just a little kid who was in way over her head. I knew exactly how she felt.

She was snuggled close to Ms. Everdeen. Katniss was sleeping at the foot of the bed. She looked like she was about to fall out of the bed but she was very still in her sleep. Not like me. Asleep, they looked just as they did the morning of the Reaping that landed me in my first Games. Prim sleeping close to her mother, Katniss the silent protector, and me, awake and alert, watching over them from afar. There were only two beds in our room. The Hadley's only had four, and their room was about the same size.

Theoretically I probably should have been sharing the bed with Katniss. It would have been easier than the three of them crushing into the one bed together. But it didn't work out that way. Instead I had a bed to myself because I was still recuperating from the lightning blast and 'miscarriage' and because no one could sleep with me anyway, what with the nightmares and the thrashing around. The only person who could sleep in the bed with me was in the Capitol right now.

After tossing and turning for hours, I finally accepted that it would be a wakeful night. As they usually were. The only reason that I had been sleeping so much as I had over the past few weeks was because of the Morphling that they were giving me. But I was finally completely off of it and I had never been so grateful. Everything was suddenly much clearer. Unfortunately it also meant that sleep was elusive. So under Buttercup's watchful eye, I tiptoed across the cold tiled floor to the dresser.

The middle drawer contained my government-issued clothes. Not very pretty. I dressed nicer back in District 12. Everyone wore the same gray pants and shirt, the shirt tucked in at the waist. Although there was also the nice little jumpsuit that we got. We had an option to wear either one. One of the only options that the people of District 13 seemed to get. Underneath the clothes, I kept the few items that I had on me when I was lifted from the arena. I had recently become too paranoid to leave them out.

Just in case someone decided to try and take them. My Mockingjay pin. Cato's token, the gold locket with photos of Ms. Everdeen, Prim, Katniss and Gale inside. His wedding ring looped in it. A silver parachute that held a spile for tapping trees, and the pearl Cato gave me a few hours before I blew out the force field. District 13 confiscated my tube of skin ointment for use in the hospital, and my bow and arrows because only guards had clearance to carry weapons. They were in safekeeping in the armory.

The two photographs that I had and the picture that Cato had drawn were the only things that were sitting out. Boggs had promised me that no one would touch them. I smiled weakly and placed my forefinger and middle finger against the picture of Cato and I in the cave after the wildfire. Even though it had happened well over a year ago it was a memory that I was sure would never fade. You know, I never had a redeeming quality until you.

Neither did I, Cato.

My fingers felt around for the parachute and I slid my fingers inside until they closed around the pearl. I sniffled softly as I dumped the spile back into the cabinet and went to sit back on my bed cross-legged. A few minutes later I found myself rubbing the smooth iridescent surface of the pearl back and forth against my lips. Why? I couldn't have said. For some reason, it was soothing. A cool kiss from the giver himself, since it had been so long since I had felt a real one.

Slowly I sank back into the bed and let out a few deep breaths. My hand gently splayed out to my side. For a moment I hesitated, wondering what I was doing. That was when I realized what I had been doing. I was searching for Cato. But he wasn't here. Not yet. I sighed and dropped down against the sheets, holding the pearl tightly. Eventually I drifted off into a restless sleep. At first it was a simple dream about Cato, as I had dreamed about so often since being brought to District 13.

But it hadn't stayed that way for too long. Like so many of my dreams, it very quickly turned to a nightmare. I had been wrapped in a hug with Cato when I had felt something damp pressing against my stomach. We had jumped apart when I had realized that his stomach had a gaping wound in it. Someone had stabbed him. And I was too late to stop it. The blood was already flowing and soaking my hands. It wasn't until the light left his eyes that I realized that I was the one who was holding the knife.

My mouth dropped open in a piercing scream. I had done it... I killed him... A moment later I launched myself up in bed, still screaming at the top of my lungs. As I tried to leap from the bed and sprint off, I realized that something was holding me down. It wasn't something, actually, it was someone. They were pressing me down into the bed, keeping me from running off. My eyes sprang open and I relaxed the moment that I realized that it was just Cato. We were alone in the small room.

"It's okay... It's just a dream... You're okay," Cato whispered.

His voice was low and comforting. The way that it always was after I woke up from one of my horrible nightmares. My skin was soaked with sweat and so were the sheets. Cato gently pulled me into his lap as I let out a few deep breaths, trying to calm myself down. He was alive. He was here with me. I hadn't done anything to him. He was healthy and alive. Cato pressed a small kiss against my forehead as he gently took his thumbs and ran them over my temples.

"I'm sorry. It's just a nightmare," I said softly.

"That's okay, I get them, too," Cato said.

Apparently he did. That was what everyone told me. But I never knew. Even after a year, I still never knew when he had a nightmare. He would take care of me when I had them, but I never knew how he was having one. It was like he said. He didn't thrash around. He didn't scream. Supposedly he did, but it was only when he was back home and unable to sleep with me near him. Mine were worse when he was gone, too.

"You should wake me up when you get them," I said.

"It's okay, Aspen. They're always about losing you. Once I wake up and see that you're here, I'm okay again," Cato said, gently running his hands over my arms.

It was very reminiscent of a conversation that we had been in before. "What was the first thing you thought about me?" I asked, after a few beats of silence.

"What?" Cato asked, looking surprised.

"Tell me. When you saw my first Reaping, what did you think about me?" I goaded.
"I thought that you were... interesting," Cato said. I snorted under my breath. That was one way to describe me. "There had never been a volunteer from District 12 before. Not that I could remember. You were strong and brave. Heartbroken, too. I wanted to know more about you."

"That so? Have you learned enough?" I asked.

"I could never learn enough about you. I want to know everything," he said.

Slowly I glanced around the room. We were in the middle of a war. The wrong time to get to know each other. "We don't have enough time," I muttered.

"Maybe not," Cato begrudgingly agreed.

"But there are plenty of things that you do know about me," I commented.

"That's true. You like the heat. You don't like the cold. But you do like the snow. You bite your lip when you're nervous. The last time that you cried before all of this was when you were six and you broke your arm. You love coffee and you only drink it black. You have to have all of your books and papers in line with each other. You love singing but hate doing it in public," Cato murmured.

My heart was fluttering slightly. It was one of those moments that I realized just how much Cato loved me. Because he knew all of those little things. He knew that I liked the warm weather from the Capitol but the snow made me smile. Because I loved playing in it. At least, I had when I was a little kid. It had always made me happy, especially when Gale and Katniss would come and play with me. And, as she got a little older, we would take Prim out with us. She had always loved it.

When we met, I had always bit my lip when I was nervous. It was a bad habit. Something that I had done since I was a little kid. My lip used to always be torn up. It was something that the Prep Team had been forced to work with when I had first gotten here. I'd grown out of the habit during the Games. If I had still done it then I would have completely bit apart my lip and permanently scarred it. Instead I had come to the habit of digging my nails into my palms, something that Cato would try to get me to stop.

My tears seemed to never stop these days. It seemed like I was always crying. Because now there was always something for me to cry about. Coffee was something that I definitely loved. But I didn't like the cream or sugar. It made it too sweet. Unrealistic. I liked the bitterness. Everything in my shelves was always in line with each other. It had always bothered me when things were out of place. Singing was always one of my favorite things to do. It always would be. But I would have never done it for the Capitol.

"Just in case I thought that you didn't really know me," I muttered.

"Your turn," Cato said.

My eyebrow quirked. "What's that?" I asked dumbly.

"What did you think when you saw me for the first time?" Cato asked.

A tiny snort came out of my mouth. "That I stood no chance. Not against you. I was looking you over and trying to figure you out. Weapon, strengths, and weaknesses," I said. It made me realize just how cold and calculating I was. I had always been the real Career. "Then I looked at you and I was immediately hooked."

A grin turned up on the corner of Cato's lips. "Oh?" he asked.

"I thought that you were very attractive," I admitted.

Now he was definitely grinning. We both laughed as Cato kissed me gently behind the ear. "Now I don't feel so bad for looking at you the way that I did," Cato said lowly.

"Cato!" I barked, embarrassed. "Can I ask you something?"

"Of course," he said.

"How can you be so understanding about everything? Everything that I've put you through?" I asked.

"Because I love you. There's always one person in your life that you can't walk away from, even if you know that it would make things so much easier. You're mine," Cato admitted.

A tear formed in my eyes and I sniffed, blinking it back. "You should walk away. It would be so much easier," I muttered.

"Maybe. But when two people really care about each other, they always find a way to make it work. No matter how hard it is. We're not easy, Aspen. We never will be. But I wouldn't trade us for anything in the world," Cato said.

"I wouldn't either," I said, my voice breaking.

"I'm going to take you back home one day, Aspen," Cato promised.

"It's destroyed," I whispered, my voice becoming weaker.

"We'll rebuild it," Cato said.

He's too good for you. "That's not your home. District 2 is your home," I said weakly.

Cato shook his head and gently rolled us over, so that I was laying flat on his chest. "My home is wherever you are," Cato said, tucking a strand of hair behind my ears. "We'll go back. Live in that house in Victor's Village. Take Katniss, Prim, and your mother. Even that stupid cat."

Snorting under my breath, I pushed my head down into his shoulder. A moment later I glanced back up. "Buttercup. That's his name. You've never met him, have you?" I asked.

Cato shook his head. "No. Will you introduce me when we get back home?"

"Of course."

Although I had a feeling that he wouldn't want to meet Buttercup. But he was also better with animals than I was. He was better with everything than I was. Cato rolled us over again so that I was underneath him. He pressed his lips against mine as I wound my hands back around his neck. My heart was fluttering as his hand wound its way down my stomach to pull at the shirt that I was wearing, making my stomach twist with something in between anticipation and nerves. Like always.

But that was also the moment that I realized that it wasn't just anticipation and nerves. It was something so much more. It was the first time that I realized that I didn't have to just live in the now. It was the first time that I realized that there was no use in just living in the now. It was the first time that I thought that I might have been able to have a future. And Cato Hadley was my future. He was the only person that I could have ever thought about having a future with.

"Will you stay with me?" I asked, breaking the kiss.

"Of course. Yeah," Cato said. He moved onto my side and grabbed me around the waist. "Always."

His lips gently traced the word across my jugular. I shivered slightly as I pressed myself into his chest. Just as I had so many times before. And I let myself fall asleep to the sound of his heartbeat, just as I had so many times before. But a moment later I shot upright in bed, not screaming, just panting. Cato was gone. He was just a dream... Just a fragment of my imagination. But I still pressed a hand against my throat, still feeling the ghost of his touch.

"Aspen?" Prim whispered. My head jerked over towards her. She was awake, peering at me through the darkness. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Just a bad dream. Go back to sleep," I said.

My voice was very soft to make sure that I didn't wake up Ms. Everdeen and Katniss. I had woken them up enough recently. They were always getting woken up by the piercing screams and manic thrashing that would start in the middle of the night and be almost impossible to stop. My words right now were as soothing as I could make them. It was automatic. Shutting Prim and Ms. Everdeen out of things to shield them. Things were a little different with Katniss. She was older and stronger. She could take it.

But even she didn't hear about everything that had happened to me. Because I couldn't put that burden on anyone. Not even Gale or Cato. They didn't deserve that. Careful not to rouse Ms. Everdeen or Katniss, Prim eased herself from the bed, scooped up Buttercup, and sat beside me. I curled my feet up underneath my knees and smiled weakly at her. She touched the hand that had curled around the pearl. Now I realized that I had fallen asleep with it in my hands. Maybe that was why I'd had the dream.

"Aspen? Prim?" Katniss called.

Our voices and movements had likely woken her up. She had always been a light sleeper. "We're here," I whispered back.

If nothing else, at least we could keep Ms. Everdeen out of the conversation. And with Prim awake, I couldn't talk too much about what was happening. She was getting older, she was getting stronger, but I couldn't tell her everything that had happened. She was still too young and the whole thing was my burden to bear. My own faults. My own problems. Katniss jumped up from her own bed gently and slid into bed with Prim and me. She laid down at my hip and pulled Prim against her.

"Everyone's awake?" Katniss asked.

"Not for long," Prim said, referring to the fact that we had only been up for a few minutes. "Mom's asleep though."

"Come here, Cat," I said, pulling her closer.

The three of us used to always sleep like this. "You're cold," Prim commented.

Taking a spare blanket from the foot of the bed, she wrapped it around all four of us, enveloping me in her warmth and Buttercup's furry heat as well. Katniss laid against me and I smiled. It had been a long time since I had slept, almost completely content, with the two of them. Right now it was nice to even have Buttercup here. I noticed that the cat laid itself a little closer to me than normal. I couldn't figure out why. Maybe because he knew that I was hurting. Because he knew that I couldn't take more hurt.

The four of us rearranged ourselves in the bed together. I was up on the pillows with my feet tucked underneath myself. Katniss was on one side of me with her elbow propped up on my hip. Prim was curled into my other side with her head laid on my waist. Buttercup was in between the two of us, purring contentedly. For the first time in a long time, even before the first Games, I was comfortable in bed with someone other than Cato.

"Thanks, sweetie," I told Prim, pulling up the blanket a little tighter.

"You could tell us, you know. We're good at keeping secrets. Even from Mother," Prim said.

"She's right, you know," Katniss said.

So she was really gone, then. The little girl with the back of her shirt sticking out like a duck tail, the one who needed help reaching the dishes, and who begged to see the frosted cakes in the bakery window. Katniss and I exchanged a quick look. Prim was even braver than I was sometimes. Time and tragedy had forced her to grow too quickly, at least for my taste, into a young woman who stitched bleeding wounds and knew Ms. Everdeen could hear only so much. Where had my bug gone?

"I know. You two are good like that. At least, most of the time," I said, giving Katniss a pointed glare.

Now that one Prim must not have known about. She looked very confused. That was one thing that Prim couldn't know about. "Oh, stop," Katniss said, rolling her eyes. "What's on your mind?"

"Come on," Prim goaded.

"Tomorrow morning, I'm going to agree to be the Mockingjay," I told them.

My words were so sudden that it was obvious that I had surprised them. "Good, Aspen," Katniss whispered.

"Because you want to or because you feel forced into it?" Prim asked.

That one definitely got to me. She was much more intuitive than I thought that she was. So I laughed a little. Even Katniss laughed. After a beat, Prim laughed, too. The three of us had to be quiet to make sure that we didn't wake Ms. Everdeen up. She wouldn't have been happy to know that we were chatting about the Mockingjay. I had a feeling that she didn't want me to do it. Because she knew just how dangerous that position was. Even more dangerous than the Games themselves.

"Both, I guess. No, I want to. I have to, if it will help the rebels defeat Snow." I squeezed the pearl more tightly in my fist. "No one hates the Capitol more than me. It's just... Cato. I'm afraid if we do win, the rebels will execute him as a traitor. He's my husband. I can't stand that happening to him," I whispered desperately.

Losing him was my worst nightmare. I had him back now. He was right there, in the Capitol. Healthy. Alive. Maybe not totally happy and healthy, but he was alive, and that was all that mattered. Losing him now would have been something unbearable. Not when so much had already happened. Prim and Katniss exchanged a long look, likely both thinking it over. I had to guarantee his safety either way. He had it with the Capitol. Now I needed it with the rebels. To my surprise, Prim came up with an answer first.

"Aspen, I don't think you understand how important you are to the cause. Important people usually get what they want. If you want to keep Cato safe from the rebels, you can," Prim said.

"Prim is right. There’s got to be some way to keep Cato safe from the rebels," Katniss agreed.

"Am I important enough?" I asked.

They certainly seemed to think that I was. It was the only reason that they hadn't let me die when I had first come to Thirteen. "Of course you are. To them and to us," Prim said.

I brushed back her hair and smiled weakly. "I guess I'm important. They went to a lot of trouble to rescue me. They took me to Twelve," I said, remembering just how dangerous it had been.

"Exactly. Just demand it," Prim said.

"You mean... I could demand that they give Cato immunity? And they'd have to agree to it?" I asked.

Katniss and Prim exchanged another look before nodding again. "Just threaten what they can't have," Katniss advised. I stared at her blankly. "You changing your mind."

Of course. The one thing that they couldn't have was me telling them that I would be the Mockingjay, only to have them schedule all sorts of appearances and making speeches and rallying the Districts, only to back out of it. Especially if they made all of that public knowledge. It would make us all look terrible and halt the rebellion. Plus I was smart enough to know that they needed me. There could only be one Mockingjay and, unfortunately, that was me.

"I think you could demand almost anything and they'd have to agree to it." Prim wrinkled her brow. "Only how do you know they'll keep their word?" she questioned.

Suddenly I remembered all of the lies that Haymitch told Cato and me to get us to do what he wanted. What was to keep the rebels from reneging on the deal? A verbal promise behind closed doors, even a statement written on paper - those could easily evaporate after the war. Their existence or validity denied. Any witnesses in Command would be worthless. In fact, they'd probably be the ones writing out Cato's death warrant. I would need a much larger pool of witnesses. I would need everyone I could get.

"It will have to be public," I said. Buttercup gave a flick of his tail that I took as an agreement. "I'll make Coin announce it in front of the entire population of Thirteen."

"Perfect. And Cato's family will love that," Katniss said brightly.

They would be thrilled to hear that I was going to save him. He would be safe. "They will. They're already thrilled that he's alive. Keeping him safe from whatever Thirteen will do to him will be even better," I said happily.

At least somewhat happily. Prim smiled. "Oh, that's good. It's not a guarantee, but it will be much harder for them to back out of their promise," Prim said.

"I'll kill Coin myself if she backs out of it," I growled.

"I'll be right there with you," Katniss agreed.

My head turned to her in surprise. "I thought that you didn't like Cato?" I asked.

Katniss gave me a long look. "He's growing on me," she finally admitted.

"Is that so?" I asked.

"Yes. Because I've seen all that he does for you. And I've seen just how happy he makes you. I don't want to see him hurt. Because it'll hurt you," Katniss said softly.

The two of us stared at each other for a long time. I couldn't believe that she was really friendly with him now. I knew that she had been trying to get along with Cato for my well-being. I knew that she had been trying and I knew that Gale had been trying to do the same thing. I would always appreciate it. And I really appreciated knowing that they were going to stand by me with this. At least, Katniss would. I wasn't sure if I was going to tell Gale about it. I didn't know how he would react.

"Yes. That would hurt me a lot. More than anything," I finally said.

"Maybe we can all hang out together when he gets here," Prim said, making me smile.

There was the little kid in her. "He might need some time to readjust to everything, but I think that he'll manage. He'll be okay soon enough," I said.

He would just need some time to acclimate and get over whatever happened in the Capitol. "We'll all help him heal. That's what we're all here for. To heal each other. No matter how hard or how long it takes," Katniss said.

It made me smile. They were really willing to change everything. The way that they felt about Cato, the way that they felt about me, and how strong I we all were. We were going to figure this out. We were going to figure everything out. The two of them smiled at me as I grabbed them both and brought them into little hugs. My sisters. My best friends. I ended up feeling something that I hadn't felt in a long time. It was the kind of relief that followed an actual solution.

"I should wake you up more often, little duck," I teased Prim.

"I wish you would," Prim said. She leaned over and gave me a kiss.

"You suck, Cat," I teased.

Katniss set her typical glare on me; something that I hadn't seen in a long time. "Yeah. And you're an ass," Katniss snapped, making all three of us giggle.

"Try and sleep now, all right?" Prim asked.

Slowly I nodded at her. We all did. Katniss and Prim jumped back into bed with Ms. Everdeen, shifting very slowly to make sure that they weren't going to wake her up. I slowly slid back into bed, the pearl still clasped tightly in my hands. It was the first time in a long time that I hadn't had a nightmare. Because my worst nightmare had been proven false. Cato was alive. As my eyes slid closed and my hand tightened on the pearl, I had a pleasant dream for the first time in a long time.

That afternoon. That damned afternoon. The afternoon that he had drawn that picture. The one that showed the life in my eyes. The life that had only recently come back. The slight part in my mouth when I started thinking. The flyaway hairs from the braid that I would put my hair in. And that little crinkle in my eyelids when I smiled. Of course, he hadn't shown me that picture for a long time. I had been clueless about it until that day had almost been over.

We were sitting up on the roof together. The sun was starting to sink in the sky, letting me know that we must have been entering the back half of the afternoon. My hands were in my lap, twirling the blankets around. I was humming an old hymn that Mr. Everdeen had taught me under my breath, slowly tracing my hands up and down Cato's legs. He had a notepad propped up against my shoulders as he flicked his pencil back and forth. The picture was facing away from me so that I couldn't see what he was drawing.

"I didn't know that you liked to draw," I finally said, breaking the comfortable silence.

"I never really did before. It's something that I just started doing recently. I like it," Cato said.

"You're really good."

He had shown me a picture of the flower crown that he had done earlier. He hadn't shown me the one that he was working on now yet. "Been practicing recently," Cato said.

"Can I see?" I asked.

"No. Not until I'm done."

"That's not fair!" I barked.

Cato briefly looked up from his paper. "Why not?" he asked.

"Because I'm your wife."

"Not good enough."

"Excuse you!" I hissed, reaching back to slap him on the chest. He laughed under his breath. "I'm your wife, I deserve to know."

Cato briefly placed down the picture, making sure that I couldn't see it. "Yes. You are. But that doesn't mean that I'm going to show you. Not until I'm finished," he said, pressing a kiss on my forehead.

He picked up the picture again and went back to drawing. "Will you at least tell me what it is that you're doing?" I asked.

"When I'm done," Cato promised.

"Oh, you're such a jerk. I deserve to see what you're painting," I growled, smacking him.

"Drawing. Not painting," Cato muttered.

He was definitely in his zone. More so than I had ever seen before. Even more than when he was swinging his sword back and forth. "Whatever. Come on, Cato. Show me," I said, poking at his leg.

"I'll show you when I'm done. It's important that I finish it first," Cato said.

"You sound very intense about it," I teased.

The corners of Cato's lips quirked upwards. "Quiet," Cato snapped playfully.

"I thought that you liked hearing me talk?" I offered.

"I do. Just not right now," Cato said.

The two of us sat together for a while as I crossed one leg over the other, tightening the blanket around me slightly. "Do you like to draw?" I asked quietly.

He had never mentioned his habit of drawing to me before. I couldn't remember him ever saying anything about it. "Yes. It relaxes me. Something to keep my hands busy. I used to swing around a sword or twirl a knife. That would make me feel better. Then it changed. Now I like to draw," Cato said, almost absentmindedly.

"Peeta liked to draw and paint, too," I whispered. That was enough to draw Cato's attention. He glanced up from the paper to stare down at me. Suddenly I felt a little bashful. "That was how he got so good at camouflage. He would decorate the cakes in his bakery. They're really good. His brother Rye does them now."

"Was he good?" Cato asked, gently running his fingers down my arms.

"Extremely. His parents gave me some of his paintings. There's one of Katniss and me up on a hill, weapons at our sides, waiting for game," I said, my voice catching in my throat. "That's my favorite."

Some emotion shot through his eyes. "You have it?" he asked.

"Yeah. It's hanging up in my room," I said. "I hope that Katniss takes it -"

"You two can share it when you're back," Cato said.

"No -"

"Sing something," he interrupted.

That was when I knew that he wouldn't let me take the conversation any further. No more arguments. Not today. Not on one of the last peaceful days that we would ever have. This was the last peaceful day that I would have. He would get his chance to have more. It would take some time, and they might not ever be like they were now, but he would get there. Cato brushed the hair back behind my ears and I looked up at him, deciding to give into his wish for a song.

"What do you want to hear?" I asked.

"Anything," Cato said.

So I ran through the songs that I had heard all of my life. There were a number of songs that I knew. So many that I hadn't gotten the chance to sing in many years. There was one in particular that I had always liked. But it was one that I hadn't sang in a long time. It was one of the few that I had been taught by Mr. Everdeen. And I was the only person who he had taught it to. Because he had always wanted one thing to be between us. One thing that he had gotten to be my father for. So I took a deep breath and sang softly.

"Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay
Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay

"Lay down your head and I'll sing you a lullaby
Back to the years of loo-li lai-lay
And I'll sing you to sleep and I'll sing you tomorrow
Bless you with love for the road that you go

"May you sail far to the far fields of fortune
With diamonds and pearls at your head and your feet
And may you need never to banish misfortune
May you find kindness in all that you meet

"May there always be angels to watch over you
To guide you each step of the way
To guard you and keep you safe from all harm
Loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay

"May you bring love and may you bring happiness
Be loved in return to the end of your days
Now fall off to sleep, I'm not meaning to keep you
I'll just sit for a while and sing loo-li, lai-lay

"May there always be angels to watch over you
To guide you each step of the way
To guard you and keep you safe from all harm
Loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay, loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay

"Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li, lai-lay
Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay
Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay
Loo-li, loo-li, loo-li lai-lay
Loo-li, lai-lay."

As my voice trailed off, Cato smiled down at me. I could see that his eyes were getting heavy. It had been designed as a lullaby. "That's pretty," Cato said softly.

And it always had been. "I used to sing it to Prim and Katniss to get them to go to sleep. It's been years since I've sang it. The last time was... the morning of Katniss's first Reaping," I said, remembering that horrible day. The scariest day that I had ever experienced, before the day that Prim was Reaped. "To put her back to sleep before she had to go."

"They need you," Cato said.

"Not anymore. Katniss is a big kid and even Prim... they've grown up," I muttered.

"Because you were there for them. You have to keep being there for them," Cato said.

"And what about you?" I asked shortly.

"What about me?" Cato asked.

"What if I need you to be here for me?" I asked.

Cato leaned down and pressed a small kiss against my mouth. "I'll always be there with you," Cato said, running his hands down my arms and smiling sadly at me.

In the morning, I jerked awake in bed and shot up, breathing out heavily. Katniss and Prim were staring at me. Ms. Everdeen smiled softly and pressed the sweaty hair back off of my face. The morning was here. I could hear the bells signaling a new day of work for the people in District 13. And for me... a new beginning, I supposed. Prim was sitting on the edge of the bed and poking me on the shoulder. Clearly I had been sleeping through the bells. I wasn't used to hearing them.

It took me a few moments too long to realize that they were waiting for me. They were wondering what the hell had happened. They knew that it was a bad dream but, like usual, they wouldn't dare ask me what it was about. So I just smiled weakly and stood up, getting changed for the day. That was enough to make them turn away. I had always known that the one thing that I had to do was convince them that it was just a bad dream and nothing more. There was nothing else bad happening.

They knew the truth by now, but they weren't going to call me out on it. Not today. I started running the brush through my hair and changing back into the standard District 13 uniform when I glanced back at the picture frame. I had almost forgotten that it was just a dream. For a moment I had been so confident that Cato would be in bed with me. Or in the next room over with the Hadley's. But I would just have to wait until he actually was with me. Which would hopefully be soon.

The four of us finished getting dressed before heading out into the main hallway. My hands were shaking slightly as I shook them out. I was nervous. What for? Maybe that they wouldn't accept my demand of saving Cato and the rest of the Victors. Not that I cared for Enobaria or Johanna or really even knew Annie. But she meant the world to Finnick and, to be fair, Johanna had risked her own life to save mine. As we walked into the main hall I held my hand under the scheduler and watched.

The moment that I turned my gaze downwards, I saw that 7:00 – Breakfast was directly followed by 7:30 - Command, which was fine since I might as well have started the ball rolling. That was good with me. I wanted to get this done and get the whole thing started. The sooner that I started performing as the Mockingjay was the sooner that they would rescue Cato. Or we could win the war and he would be safe. Either way, it would be over with soon enough. It just started with today.

At the dining hall, I flashed my schedule, which included some kind of ID number, in front of a sensor. As I slid my tray along the metal shelf before the vats of food, I saw that breakfast was its usual dependable self - a bowl of hot grain, a cup of milk, and a small scoop of fruit or vegetables. Today, mashed turnips. I groaned at the sight of it. Sometimes I really did miss the Capitol food. It was the one thing that I might have missed about the place. Other than Cinna, but that was too late.

All of the food came from Thirteen's underground farms. Apparently they were quite impressive. I hadn't seen them yet. I sat at the table assigned to the Everdeen's and Hawthorne's and some other refugees. Of course, it was assigned to the Antaeus's, too, but considering that I was the only one left - and that wasn't technically true - no one ever bothered saying it. Besides, the only title that they cared to give me was Mockingjay. I shoveled my food down, wishing for seconds, but there were never seconds here.

They had nutrition down to a science. You left with enough calories to take you to the next meal, no more, no less. Serving size was based on your age, height, body type, health, and amount of physical labor required by your schedule. The people from Twelve were already getting slightly larger portions than the natives of Thirteen in an effort to bring us up to weight. I guessed bony soldiers tired too quickly. It was working, though. In just a month, we were starting to look healthier, particularly the kids.

Katniss and Prim easily went through their food. I'd noticed that Prim was gaining some weight. Which was good, since she had lost some after the announcement of the Quell. Gale set his tray beside me and I tried not to stare at his turnips too pathetically, because I really wanted more. Despite the fact that they were gross, I was starving. I'd barely eaten lately. He was already too quick to slip me his food. Even though I turned my attention to neatly folding my napkin, a spoonful of turnips slopped into my bowl.

"You've got to stop that," I said. But since I was already scooping up the stuff, it wasn't too convincing. "Really. It's probably illegal or something."

"Share it, then," Gale said.

So I split the rest of the turnips between Katniss and Prim. "Thanks," Katniss said.

"Thank you," Prim chirped.

They had very strict rules about food. For instance, if you didn't finish something and wanted to save it for later, you couldn't take it from the dining hall. Apparently, in the early days, there was some incident of food hoarding. For a couple of people like Gale, Katniss, and me, who had been in charge of our families' food supply for years, it didn't sit well. We knew how to be hungry, but not how to be told how to handle what provisions we have. In some ways, District 13 was even more controlling than the Capitol.

"What can they do? They've already got my communicuff," Gale said.

"Which is quite the punishment," I teased.

"I could cry for myself," Gale said.

We both snorted into the tiny remains of our turnips. I giggled under my breath as I leaned over and stole the last little bit off of Gale's plate. He was snorting under his breath again. I leaned back in the seat slightly and laid my head on my hand. Everyone was giving me concerned looks, but no one said anything. Probably because they knew that I was in deep thought. Whatever was about to happen was important. The Mockingjay was finally going to play her part.

As I scraped my bowl clean, I had a sudden inspiration. The food here was repulsive. It was even worse than the food back in District 12. At least there we had to have food that was high in fat to keep us alive. We didn't eat much and they were small portions, but they were fatty and greasy. Here we had slightly larger portions but everything tasted like cardboard. But that was just because that was what they could grow. But if we could get something more...

"Hey, maybe I should make that a condition of being the Mockingjay," I said suddenly.

Gale and Katniss turned to look at me. "That I can feed you turnips?" Gale asked.

"No, you idiot," I barked.

"Well, what?" Gale asked sharply.

"That we can hunt," I suggested. That got his attention. Katniss's, too. She whipped around to look at me. "You and me and Katniss. We'd have to give everything to the kitchen. But still, we could..."

My voice trailed off. No one sitting near us needed to hear what I was about to say. Because that would have only made things even worse for us. They were already questioning where our allegiances lay. No one needed to know that we were interested in talking about what was really happening. I didn't have to finish my sentence because they knew. Katniss and Gale understood. We could be above ground. Out in the woods. We could be ourselves again.

"Do it. Now's the time. You could ask for the moon and they'd have to find some way to get it," Gale said.

"Oh, please. I'm so sick of being here," Katniss whined.

It was enough to make me smile again. The two of them needed to be out in the woods. I wanted to be out there so badly. I missed the days that we were out in the woods with no one to hear us. Or so we had thought. Apparently there were cameras out there the entire time. But that was in District 12. There likely weren't any in District 13. At least, not in the woods. It didn't matter. They likely wouldn't say yes. Gale didn't know that I was already asking for the moon by demanding they spare Cato's life.

That would be dangerous enough. They wouldn't like that much. That would have to be the last thing that I would say. Best to save the worst for last. Or something like that. But something else dawned on me. There were other people who likely couldn't wait to get out of the confines of District 13. A number of people hated feeling that they were being suffocated down here. Cato had always wanted me to take him out to the woods and teach him to hunt. I couldn't do that right now, but I could...

"I think I'm going to ask for Dean to come out, too," I said suddenly.

"Why?" Gale asked.

"Because Dean is my friend. He's been good to me over the past year," I said, feeling a little defensive.

"So the four of us?" Gale asked.

"No. I'm going to go out with you and Katniss. And one day I'll take Dean out," I said.

It would be a good chance for the two of us to get out and speak with each other. In private. With no one else listening to what we were talking about. And I wanted to chat with Dean out of the ear shot of the rest of District 13 and our families. And if there was anyone who might have known Cato better than me, it was Dean. The two of us could just... talk. Exchange stories. Bond over the one thing that we had lost and wanted so desperately to have back.

"You sure that's such a good idea?" Gale asked.

My eyebrow quirked. "Why would it be a bad idea?" I asked.

"Because of..." Gale started, eventually trailing off.

It was obvious enough where he was trying to go with the whole thing. "The District 2 bias that you can't seem to get over? Gale, relax," I said, rolling my eyes and downing some water. "Dean is a good guy. He's been a good friend to me for the past few weeks."

"He seems to be one of the nicer guys here that I've met," Gale admitted.

"See?" I asked, my voice adopting a sing-song note. "He's not that bad."

"Just..." Gale trailed off again.

He would never trust anyone from District 2. It was just in his nature. But I would try my damnedest to get Gale to tolerate Dean. "He doesn't blame me for what happened to Cato. He's not going to hurt me out there. And you know that I have a faster draw anyways," I said, rolling my eyes. "Knock it off, Gale."

"Leave her alone, Gale. I've been hanging around with Dean. He's nice," Katniss said.

"Thank you," I said.

"You should have one of us out there with you," Gale said.

Trying to lighten the mood slightly, I smiled and nudged Gale on the shoulder. "How about I take Seneca Crane out there with me?" I asked teasingly.

"Aspen," Gale warned.

Rolling my eyes, I nodded slowly. "Okay, fine. Sorry, I know it was a bad joke." Gale was still scowling at me. "Come on, Gale. Smile. Please?" I asked, poking softly at him.

"I'm working on it. I do miss my communicuff," Gale said, wistfully tapping his wrist.

"I'll work on getting it back for you, Soldier Gale Hawthorne," I teased.

"You sound pretentious as hell," Gale said.

Katniss and I both turned to him. I had never heard him use a word like before. "I thought that you slept through writing class?" I asked.

"That was you," Gale shot back.

We both laughed under our breath. "Right." I glanced up again and saw that some others were filling in the table just a few down from our own. "I'll be right back," I said.

"Okay," Gale said.

"Hurry up. We don't have much time," Katniss said.

They were right. I needed to be on time to make sure that Coin had no extra reason to say no to any of my demands. Being on time was very important to the people of District 13. In their own way, they reminded me very much of Effie. Someone that I was shocked to say that I missed. It would have been nice to see her again for just a moment. She had slowly been realizing just how awful everything to do with the Games were. She would have hated it here, but at least she would have been safe.

Slowly I got up from the table, dumping my food, and headed over to the table that had been reserved for the Hadley family and some of the District 2 refugees. There weren't many of them. Only five. They were the people hat the Hadley's had managed to bring with them, knowing how bad things would get in District 2 after the arena was destroyed. Most of the people from District 2 seemed to really hate it in District 13 and, in turn, really seemed to hate me. Not that I could have been surprised.

Taking in a deep breath, I placed myself a little closer to the Hadley's and away from the others. I had noticed that Skye and Julie were recently trying to help me appeal to them a little more. Three of the District 2 refugees immediately sprang up from the table and headed off. I placed myself sadly in between Dean and Alana. Two of the people who genuinely did seem to like me, as I technically was Dean's sister and Alana's daughter.

"Hi," I greeted, somewhat awkwardly.

"Hey. You making your demands?" Dean asked.

"Soon." I turned over my arm to show them. "Seven-thirty I go in to speak with them," I said.

"You ready?" Dean asked.

Snorting under my breath, I shook my head. "Sort of. I don't think that I'll ever really be ready," I admitted.

Being the Mockingjay was something terrifying. I could only hope that it would help. "Well you can make pretty much any demand that you want and they'll have to say yes," Carrie said.

It was reminiscent of what Prim had told me last night. "That's what I'm hoping for," I said.

"What are you asking for?" Skye asked curiously.

"I'm not a thousand percent sure. Immunity for Cato. That's one thing that I know that I'm going to ask for. Him and all of the other Victors," I said.

That was enough to get the entire family and the rest of the District 2 refugees to glance over at me. They were all clearly shocked that one of my demands would be to save the Victors. But that was the most important part. Saving them from the Capitol was one thing. Keeping them safe from trial after the end of the war would be something completely different. At least this would likely keep them from being killed even after the fighting would supposedly be over.

"That's wonderful," Damien said brightly.

It was the happiest that I had seen him probably ever. "My concern was that Cato might get in trouble for what he did. The rebels will definitely kill him if we win," I said, making the rest of the family cringe. "And the Capitol... I don't know what they'll do. So, to keep him safe, I'll have to get him a pardon."

"Will it work?" Alana asked.

"I'm not sure. But it's worth it to try," I said.

Hope... I just had to keep having some hope... "Do you know how to make it work?" Skye asked.

"I've got an idea. We'll see if it works out. It might be hard to get Coin to agree, but I think I can persuade her," I said slowly.

"That's a good idea," Julie said.

The family were all watching me closely, probably trying to gauge my reaction to the whole thing. "I'm also going to ask if Gale, Katniss, and I can go out hunting again," I said. That caught their attention. "Not far. Just a little bit. Just to get up above ground for a little while. It's suffocating under here."

"Sounds relaxing," Carrie admitted.

"It is. I miss the quiet, slow, hunters tread," I said.

"You miss the woods, then?" Julie asked.

"If there's one thing that I miss more than Cato, it's the woods. I really do miss them. A lot," I said. A moment later I spotted some of their gazes. "I mean, I can ask if any of you can come up with me. You don't have to, I just thought that -"

"No," Dean said, cutting me off. "It sounds like fun. Teach us how to hunt, huh?"

"If you want to learn," I said, smiling softly.

"I'd love that," Dean said.

Out of the corner of my eyes I noticed Skye and Julie exchange a look. "Can we come?" Skye asked.

One of my eyebrows quirked upwards. I hadn't thought that anyone in District 2 would even want to learn to hunt. "We never learned back in District 2. They teach you that you'll mostly be able to go with whatever you find at the Cornucopia and Sponsor packages," Julie explained. "It could be fun."

It definitely was fun. They would just have to lean to be patient. "You're more than welcome to come out with me. If I can get them to agree," I added as a last-minute thought.

"Awesome! I've always wanted to learn to use a bow and arrow," Skye said.

"You don't know how?" I asked.

"Vaguely. But they teach us that up-close is much more fun. Knives and swords," Skye explained. "I mean, I could probably hit the target."

"If it was still and standing ten feet away," Julie interrupted.

We all laughed at that one. "Well I suppose I'm a good teacher," I muttered.

"You're probably the best," Dean said.

"Thanks, Dean," I said.

"I don't think anyone's ever seen someone better with them," Damien admitted.

There were only two other people that might have been able to match me. "Well I'm pretty good, but so is Katniss. She would be a good teacher, too. Although I'm a better teacher. I'm stronger and I have better aim, but Katniss is faster. Gale is good, too, but I know that we're better," I explained.

"She might get a chance to be on that special team, too," Alana said.

"Special team?" I asked.

"It's a kind of special combat team that will be heading out to the Capitol once we unite the Districts. I'm not sure how close they're going to get to the action, but they'll be out there," Alana explained.

For a moment I feared for her safety, but she would never give up a chance to fight. "She would love that," I said honestly.

"Aspen?" Aidan called.

My gaze slowly turned over to him. "Yeah, Aidan?" I asked.

"Will you teach me? How to use the bow?" Aidan asked.

"I thought that you were a sword man?" I asked.

Cato had always told me that he liked swords, just like his older brothers. I hadn't thought that he would ever be a bowman. "They don't have swords here in District 13. But they do have some bows, I think. And I want to fight," Aidan explained.

Alana dropped her glass of water. "You're not old enough," she snapped.

Deciding to try and step in before things got too tense, I leaned in between them. "But if you want to come out with me one day, I'd be more than happy to teach you how to hunt. I think that you might like it," I offered.

"Was Cato good?" Aidan asked.

"He walked loudly but he had good aim," I explained, remembering hearing the leaves and twigs crunching underneath his feet. Not enough to disturb a Tribute, but definitely enough to disturb animals. "I could teach you? I think that you might be good at it. You're young enough that you can still learn the slow and soft hunters walk."

The smile that turned up on Aidan's face was one that I had never seen before. "I would love that. Thanks!" Aidan chirped.

Maybe there was a chance that the two of us could be friends one day. "Not a problem." I smiled and glanced up at the clocks. I just had a few more minutes. "I should go. Prepare for whatever I want to say," I muttered.

"Good luck, sweetheart. Let us know how it goes," Alana said, brushing the hair off of my forehead.

"Of course."

But the moment that I stood up, I realized that the two remaining District 2 refugees were watching me closely. Two boys whom I had never spoken to. My feet failed me as I plopped back into the chair. Say something, Aspen. But my words - like my legs - kept failing me. I had never been known to have the best public speaking talents. Nope. That was definitely something that Cato had. He was better at me than almost anything. And judging by the looks the two boys were giving me, they felt the same.

"Hey... I'm Aspen," I finally managed to get out.

Who the hell would they think that you were? Idiot. "We know," one of the boys said.
"There's not a person in here who doesn't know who you are," the second boy said.

"That's true, I suppose," I muttered dumbly. "You're friends of Cato's?"

That was no more intelligent. "Yes. Old friends from the neighborhood and the Academy. I'm Felix," the first boy introduced himself.

"Marcus," the second said.

They looked like just about every other District 2 citizen that I had ever seen before. Most of them seemed to have the whole blonde hair and blue eye thing going on. There were very few who didn't. They almost reminded me of the merchant sector. Felix and Marcus both had blonde hair and blue eyes. It if weren't for the fact that Felix was much paler than Marcus, I would have thought that they were brothers. They were both tall and muscular. Just like Cato. Academy trainees, I assumed.

"It's nice to meet you both. You got out of District 2?" I asked awkwardly.

The last thing that I needed was to make them hate me even more. "We were around when the martial law started. We were some of the few people who believed that the Capitol could change. We started helping Cato train again when the Quarter Quell was announced," Marcus explained.

A bitter smile appeared on my face. I had known that he was training for the Quell. "So you're here for the war?" I asked.

I hadn't thought that anyone from District 2 would want to put an end to the Games. "Yes. We're here because we know that things can be different," Felix said.

That was when it clicked. "You lost someone to the Games. Both of you," I said softly.

Some part of me had thought that I might have offended them. But they didn't seem bothered. "Of course. Almost everyone in District 2 has lost someone to the Games," Felix explained. I nodded blankly. Of course. They all trained together. Everyone would know those who died. "I lost my sister."

My stomach churned in knots. Prim and Katniss had almost known that feeling. "I'm sorry. How long?" I asked quietly.

"Four years ago," Felix said.

That would have been the Seventy-First Hunger Games. My stomach churned in knots again. I knew those Games well. I might have only been sixteen, but I wouldn't soon forget them. That was the year that Johanna Mason had won. She had played weak the entire time, only to come out as a vicious fighter. She had slaughtered the remaining Career Tributes, who had been caught completely off-guard. Felix's sister had been one of them.

"Well... if it makes you feel any better, I'm not overly fond of Johanna either," I said.

To my surprise, it was enough to earn a laugh from Felix. "I respected her strategy. She was a good fighter and clearly very smart. She earned her title. But that doesn't make her easier to stomach," Felix said.

"I have a feeling that a lot of people feel that way about me," I said.

"They do," Marcus said. My jaws set but I nodded anyways. "I lost my cousin. Three years ago."

So the Seventy-Second Hunger Games. The next year. I didn't remember much about them. We had been starving at the time as the Peacekeepers were all in District 12, cutting off our trips into the woods. So we had mostly slept through the Games until it was time for them to end and we would be allowed back into the woods. I remembered that it was in a hot, drought-plagued forest. Just like the Quell, water was scarce. Trees would catch fire from the heat, which threatened to set the entire arena on fire.

Dangerous wild animals prowled through the bushes, and mosquitoes provided infection and disease. Poisonous mutts, like frogs and snakes, were also introduced to endanger lives. Once the competition dwindled down to the final Tributes, the Gamemakers created a deadly hurricane which caused flooding, broken trees and mudslides, including the one which buried all of the remaining Tributes underneath it. I remembered watching the whole thing very uncomfortably, not enjoying the thought of suffocation.

Only the last two Tributes managed to dig themselves out before suffocation set in, and the hurricane ended when a Victor emerged from the resulting fight. If I remembered correctly, it was the girl from District 1. And that was just barely. She had just barely managed to kill the boy from District 5. Marcus's cousin was killed during one of the mudslides. I didn't want to say it, as he likely knew and it would have been cruel to say, but suffocation was a very painful way to go.

"For both of you. I'm genuinely sorry. I can honestly say that I know exactly how it feels to lose someone to the Games," I said softly.

Felix and Marcus nodded. "We know. That's why so many people sided with you in District 2." I raised a brow. People had sided with me in District 2. "Because we all knew exactly how it felt to lose someone. We were some of the few people that never laughed at Cato for falling in love with you," Felix admitted.

"We're here to help. And now that Cato is alive..." Marcus trailed off.

"You're willing to help even more," I filled in the blanks.

"Yes," Marcus confirmed.

Perhaps they were the only others of Cato's friends who might end up liking me. "Well I'm making my demands now. One of them is for Coin to stand up in front of District 13 and announce that Cato and the other Victors will be granted immunity. They're doing what they can to stay alive. There's nothing wrong with that," I said determinedly.

The entire family smiled. Even Felix and Marcus looked vaguely pleased. "He's protecting you, you know," Felix finally said.

"I know. It's what we do," I whispered.

We would always protect each other. "It's a good way to be. More than just love," Felix said.

"Thank you for everything that you've done for him," Marcus said.

The boys must have been either nineteen or twenty but they seemed to have aged years just in front of me. As I looked at them, I scowled slightly. There was nothing good that I had done for Cato. Everything that I had done had ended up hurting him. Falling in love with him had managed to hurt him more than anything else ever would. My voice lumped in my throat as I stared at the two men in front of me. I hadn't done anything good for him. Only provide some good company over the last year.

"The only thing that I've done is land him in the Capitol and get..." I started.

But my voice suddenly died in my throat. Because there was no way that I could say what I had been about to say. Because I was about to say that I had also successfully managed to get Leah killed. But there was no way that I could have said something like that. Not with Cato's family only sitting a few feet from me and listening in on my conversation. That wasn't something that I could do to them. But Alana and Carrie leaned forward, grabbing my hands and smiling weakly at me. They knew what I was thinking.

"You've done so much for him, Aspen. And he would do everything over again to keep you safe," Alana promised.

"I know. I hate that he does that," I muttered.

Alana smiled and ran her thumb over my finger. The finger that had my wedding ring on it. When I first got to Thirteen they tried to take it. Melt it down into a weapon or a bullet or something of the likes. But I fought back against them to keep it. It had taken Gale and Katniss to come into the room and fight back against the doctors to let me keep it. A whole meeting had been called to decide whether or not I would get to keep it. Many profanity-laced minutes later, Katniss had gotten them to let me keep it.

"I've always been proud of my son. From the day that he was born. The day that he went into the Games. I wasn't happy that he went but I was so proud that he was doing something worthwhile. I knew how much he loved the Games. But I was never as proud as I was the moment that I knew he had fallen in love," Alana said.

My head was spinning. It was almost sweet to hear. The day that she had been the proudest of her son was the day that she had known that he had fallen in love. With me, of course. There must have been something, some moment, that had been the only time that she had thought that he had fallen in love. He had mentioned before that he had brought girls around, but they were always gone soon enough. There must have been something different that she had seen in me.

"When was that?" I asked Alana. "If you don't mind me asking."

Alana smiled weakly. "I knew from the moment that I heard about the two of you chatting back and forth in training," Alana said.

Just because the two of us were chatting back and forth? "Did you?" I asked curiously.

"I knew that Cato wasn't fool enough to just speak with anyone. Flirtatiously or not. That was the way that the news channels were saying that you two were talking," Alana explained. I laughed under my breath. It had been sort of flirtatiously. "I knew that if he was speaking to you, you had caught his eye."

"Yeah... He admitted that he liked me even back then," I said.

"But I knew that he was in love with you when you were in the cave and he was helping you recover," Alana continued.

"The fire or the wolf?" I asked.

"The wolf." That surprised me. I hadn't even known my true feelings for him up until we were in the cave after the fire. "That look that he gave you when he saw how bad the injuries were. When the two of you were talking. About your birthday and the other things. But it was when you asked him to stay until the end. He agreed and you told him that he was nothing like you were expecting. That was when I knew that he was in love with you," Alana continued.

My heart was fluttering slightly. "I had a feeling right then, too. That was when I started to fall in love with him," I muttered.

"Am I still not what you expected?" Cato asked.

"Will you stay with me? Until the end?" I asked softly.

Cato looked shocked. "Of course," he muttered.

"Then you're still nothing like I expected you to be," I said softly, placing my hand against his cheek.

That day was as clear as ever. Despite the heavy infection and near-deadly repercussions, I still remembered every bit of it. I remembered looking him straight in the eyes after it. I remembered seeing that my words had triggered something in him. His face had hardened. It was the first time that I realized what he genuinely meant to me. Far more than just the person who was there to entertain me while I was bored during the Games.

"I'm not happy about what happened to my son, but I will always be happy that he found someone who genuinely loves him," Alana said, smiling at me.

"I'm going to get him back and I'll make sure that nothing happens to him," I promised.

"We thank you for that, Aspen," Damien said.

"It's my pleasure. Honestly," I said.

There was nothing that would have made me happier. "Can you get us into weapons training?" Felix asked suddenly, motioning between himself and Marcus.

"Excuse me?" I asked dumbly.

"We want to fight. Everyone here wants to fight. The Capitol has gotten away with so much. It took you, Aspen... It took you to show us how horrible these Games are," Felix said. I smiled weakly. At least I had shown people what a nightmare the Games really were. "Now we're ready to fight. We just need to convince Thirteen that we are."

"I'll put it on the list," I said, smiling softly.

"Thank you," Marcus said.

"Of course. I'll see you all in a little while," I said.

They would have to be the first people that I would speak to once everything was done with. They needed to know what was happening. They needed to know that I was going to save Cato. As I got up from my seat, I quickly said goodbye to everyone. Skye and Julie both gave me hugs, making me promise that I would try as hard as I could to get them into the fighting. And I had promised Dean and Aidan that I would do everything possible to get them to come hunting with me.

Felix and Marcus had given me quick hugs so that I could promise them that I would do everything possible to get them into weapons training. Damien had given me a hug and Alana a kiss on the cheek as I promised them that I would not leave until Cato was given immunity. Marley chirped a happy goodbye as I finally departed from the table, heading back over to my own. Katniss and Gale had been watching me closely the entire time.

"They okay?" Gale asked as I dropped back down into my seat.

"They're going to be fine," I said.

"Did you tell them?" Katniss asked.

"Yes," I said.

"Tell them what?" Gale asked.

The entire time I had been so determined to not say anything about what I was planning to Gale. Mostly because I didn't know how he would react. Because I knew, no matter what, he didn't really want Cato to be allowed out scot-free. But I didn't care. I had to save him. Should I at least have given him a heads up? Before I could decide whether or not to tell him, a bell signaled the end of our eating shift. The thought of facing Coin - and likely Plutarch - alone made me nervous.

"What are you two scheduled for?" I asked.

Gale checked his arm. "Nuclear History class."

Katniss checked her own. "Me, too."

"Where, by the way, your absence has been noted," Gale continued.

Despite the fact that we were over fourteen - which was when everyone finished schooling and started training for battle - we were newcomers to Thirteen. And that meant that we were being acclimated with some of the younger children. That meant classes. And right now classes with paper and pencil were the only ones that I could handle. My body's state of weakness after the Games and 'miscarriage' were keeping me out of any type of weapons or combat training.

Not that I had ever been ready enough to start working at any weapons. Until very recently I hadn't even wanted to get out of bed. I had supposedly been in classes since a week after first arriving in District 13, but I had refused to go. And for a long time they hadn't pushed me. They had left me alone. But recently I was supposed to be back in classes and getting prepared for the fight. But I had kept ignoring the schedule and refused to go to classes. They apparently weren't very happy with me.

"I have to go to Command. Come with me?" I asked.

"Both of us?" Katniss asked.

I rolled my eyes. "No. Buttercup." Katniss gave me a sharp glare. "Yes, both of you, idiot," I snapped.

"That was uncalled for," Katniss said.

"Come on," I barked.

"All right. But they might throw me out after yesterday," Gale said.

"Don't worry about it. I've got a way to keep you in there," I said.

My leverage as Mockingjay would likely go a long way with getting what I wanted. As we went to drop off our trays, Gale said, "You know, you better put Buttercup on your list of demands, too. I don't think the concept of useless pets is well known here."

"Oh, they'll find him a job. Tattoo it on his paw every morning," I said.

"Hopefully they cook him in the oatmeal next," Katniss growled.

"Oh, come on. Prim loves him," I argued.

"Prim loves everything," Katniss said.

"I'm putting him on the list, Cat," I barked.

In all honesty, I really didn't want to keep Buttercup. He had been a little nicer to me lately. I had a feeling that he felt bad for everything that had happened to me. He must have known. It was the only thing that I could think. But that didn't mean that I liked him. He was still ugly and a jerk. But... like I had said, Prim loved him. She had likely already lost Lady. I couldn't make her lose Buttercup, too. So I made a mental note to include him for Prim's sake.

By the time we got to Command, Coin, Plutarch, and all of their people had already assembled. I was right about Plutarch being there. I was immediately sickened. Someone must have let them know that I wanted to speak today. They were all staring at me in a way that they hadn't in a long time. Maybe I just looked different today. It didn't matter. They were going to agree to what I wanted or else this war would be over before it really got a chance to get started.

The sight of Gale and Katniss raised some eyebrows, but no one threw them out. I had a feeling that it was because they were trying to tiptoe around my feelings. They just wanted to make sure that I was going to manage myself here and not go back on whatever I was about to do. My mental notes had become too jumbled, from everything and everyone's promises, so I asked for a piece of paper and a pencil right off. More than I had ever asked before. More than I had spoken before my first meeting with Coin.

My apparent interest in the proceedings - the first that I had shown since I had been here - took them by surprise. Several looks were exchanged. Probably they had some extra-special lecture planned for me. Just as they usually were. Sometimes tense and serious, other times they were a little lighter and tried to play at my heartstrings. But instead, Coin personally handed me the supplies, and everyone waited in a tense silence while I sat at the table and scrawled out my list.

Buttercup. Hunting. Cato's immunity. Announced in public. This was it. Probably my only chance to bargain. It would definitely be my only time to bargain. I would have to spit out everything that I wanted now. Think. What else do you want? I felt him, standing at my shoulder. Gale, I added to the list. Katniss, a moment later. I didn't think that I could do it without them. Then I added Felix and Marcus for training. Skye, Julie, and Dean to be allowed to leave and go hunting with me.

There had to be something else that I was missing. I started to wrack through my brain and memories to think of what I wanted. No more Games? Duh. That much was obvious if we won. Blow the Capitol to smithereens? No. There were some good and clueless people there. That wasn't fair to them. Give the Districts more food and freedom? Another obvious one. The headache started to come on and my thoughts began to tangle. I shut my eyes and started to recite my list silently.

My name is Aspen Antaeus. I am twenty years old. My home is District 12. President Snow ordered my home to be destroyed after I did something very stupid. I was in the Hunger Games. Twice. I escaped. The Capitol hates me. Cato was taken prisoner. He is alive. He is a traitor but alive. I have to keep him alive... It is and always will be my dream.

My breathing slowed and the pounding dialed back. I stared back down at the list. It still seemed too small. I should have tried to think bigger, beyond our current situation where I was of the utmost importance, to the future where I might have been worth nothing. Shouldn't I have been asking for more? For my family? For the remainder of my people? They were already safe. Those who were here would already be safe. They would rebuild District 12 after the war. No need for me to write that.

So, what? What else did I want so badly? What else could I ask for? My skin itched with the ashes of the dead. All of those people whom I had lost over the years. I felt the sickening impact of the skull against my shoe. The feeling of my heart breaking at the sight of all of those people. Dead and burned and suffocated. Desperately trying to escape. Peeta's dead family. The scent of blood and roses stung my nose. The pencil moved across the page on its own. I opened my eyes and saw the wobbly letters.

I KILL SNOW.

Was it genuinely something that they could give me? I wasn't sure. It definitely wouldn't have been an easy request. If there was any request that I could have made that was even more severe than the one about letting Cato go unharmed, it was this one. No one could see my paper. If they had, I was sure that an argument would have already been set off. But I didn't care. For Mom, Dad, Rue, Peeta, Thresh, Finch, the Mellark's, Mr. Everdeen, Cinna, Mags, Wiress... If he was captured, I wanted the privilege.

Plutarch gave a discreet cough. "About done there?"

His voice startled me. I had been so busy thinking about all of the dead people from President Snow that I had almost forgotten that I was supposed to be requesting something. I let out a deep breath and nodded. I was done. Those were the only things that I could think that I wanted to do. I glanced up and noticed the clock. I had been sitting here, in silence, for almost twenty minutes. Finnick wasn't the only one with attention problems.

"Yeah," I said. My voice sounded hoarse, so I cleared my throat. "Nothing else today. There's only one thing that I need from you today."

"And that is?" Plutarch asked.

"This is not your meeting," Coin interrupted quickly.

"Well I'm commandeering it. I need to speak with you," I said darkly.

"Let the girl speak," Plutarch said.

Clearly he sensed where this was going. I nodded gratefully and looked around the room. Everyone was watching me with interest. It was the first and only time that I had been even moderately interested in what was going on. Slowly and with deliberate movements, I managed to get to my feet and stand at the head of the table. Directly across from Coin and Plutarch. I tried to muster up the most serious face that I could.

"Thank you for agreeing to meet with me. Yeah, so this is the deal. I'll be your Mockingjay," I said.

That delivered the exact response that I was expecting. I paused so that I could wait for them to make their sounds of relief, congratulate, and slap one another on the back. That was exactly what they were doing. I noticed that Brutus and Seneca were grinning at each other. Seneca looked very proud of me. Brutus was giving me the good old 'I-told-you-so' look. Coin stayed as impassive as ever, watching me, unimpressed with my announcement.

"But I have some conditions." Now everyone looked very curious. Seneca was grinning. Brutus rolled his eyes. I smoothed out the list and began. "My family gets to keep our cat," I said determinedly.

For a moment there was silence. No one quite understood what I was saying. Most people didn't even know that we had a cat hiding out in our room. I realized too late that I probably shouldn't have just been quiet and waited for the war to be over. That was stupid of me. But I figured that maybe they would just get over it. I didn't think that it would be that big of a deal, being my easiest request. It turned out that they didn't. Brutus's barking laughter was enough to bring everyone back to their senses.

My tiniest request set off an argument. The Capitol rebels saw it as a nonissue - of course, I could keep my pet – while those from Thirteen spelled out what extreme difficulties that presented. Finally it was worked out that we would be moved to the top level, which had the luxury of an eight-inch window above ground. Buttercup may come and go to do his business. He was expected to feed himself. If he missed curfew, he would be locked out. If he caused any security problems, he would be shot immediately.

That sounded okay to me. It wasn't the best deal that we could have been given, but at least they weren't going to demand that he be killed or that he be brought back to District 12. Prim would be happy enough. Besides, it wasn't so different from how he had been living since we had left District 12. Except for the shooting part. That would be the real danger. If he looked too thin, I could slip him a few entrails, provided my next request was allowed.

"I want to hunt. With Gale. And Katniss. Out in the woods," I said.

My words were much less confident that time around. I was stumbling over myself as I tried to speak. Nothing sounded very good. I sounded very tense about the entire thing. Probably because I was. For whatever reason, that request was one of the ones that made me more nervous. And it was for no reason. I really couldn't have argued if they were going to say no. It wasn't a life or death situation. But my second request gave everyone pause.

"We won't go far. We'll use our own bows. You can have the meat for the kitchen," Gale added.

They looked like they were thinking about it. I hurried on before they could say no. "It's just... I can't breathe shut up here like a... I would get better, faster, if... I could hunt," I explained dumbly.

Why was it that they wanted me as the Mockingjay? I couldn't speak well in public. I could barely speak well in private. If they wanted me to rally the Districts, it had better be from actions. There was no way that I could do something like giving speeches. I would have to be out there fighting. This would be a good way to brush up on my shooting skills. Plutarch began to explain the drawbacks to my request - the dangers, the extra security, the risk of injury - but Coin cut him off.

"No. Let them. Give them two hours a day, deducted from their training time. A quarter-mile radius. With communication units and tracker anklets. What's next?" Coin asked.

For a moment I was flabbergasted. I hadn't thought that she would be on my side. If nothing, I had really been expecting her to think that it wouldn't be a good idea. And it likely wouldn't. The Capitol would bomb the three of us into smithereens within seconds if they spotted us out in the woods. Maybe they didn't come out here. Thirteen was likely monitoring the sky for Capitol hovercrafts and they would be keeping an eye on us. Good enough for me. I skimmed my list again.

"I want Dean, Julie, and Skye to be able to come out, too. They want to learn and I want the three of them to come out there with me," I continued.

"Only two at a time," Coin said.

"What?" I asked.

"Only two people out with you at a time," Coin clarified.

There wasn't much more than I could ask for than that. At least they were letting us out. "Alright," I conceded.

"What else?" Plutarch asked.

Scanning down my list again, I found what else I wanted. "Allow Felix and Marcus to start weapons training. They want to fight. They're of age. It's time to trust them," I said.

"They can start with one hour a day. Next," Coin said.

Obviously she knew that something bigger was coming. These were small and relatively simple requests. "Gale. I'll need him with me to do this," I said.

"With you how? Off camera? By your side at all times? Do you want him presented as your new lover?" Coin asked.

There was no laughter in the room. Everyone was staring in between the two of us. None of them could say anything. There was nothing to say. No one, except for me. Gale managed to keep a steady look on his face. But my gaze wasn't on him. It was on Coin. She hadn't said that with any particular malice - quite the contrary, her words were very matter-of-fact. But my mouth still dropped open in shock. I couldn't believe that she had said that. That someone else had noticed our bond just by watching.

"Excuse you?" I hissed.

But there wasn't that much malice in my words. Because I was still floored from her words. "I think we should continue the current romance. A quick defection from Cato could cause the audience to lose sympathy for her. Especially since they think she's pregnant with his child," Plutarch said.

They were so determined that the whole thing really had been for the cameras. I was still wordless. "Agreed. So, on-screen, Gale can simply be portrayed as a fellow rebel. Is that all right?" Coin asked. I just stared at her. She repeated herself impatiently. "For Gale. Will that be sufficient?"

"We can always work him in as your cousin," Fulvia said.

"We're not cousins," Gale and I said together.

"Right, but we should probably keep that up for appearances' sake on camera. Off camera, he's all yours. Anything else?" Plutarch asked.

But I couldn't believe them. As per usual, my anger was going to get the better of me. "How dare you. All of you," I growled, momentarily forgetting about the task at hand.

"Pardon?" Coin asked.

My jaws were set together angrily. I couldn't believe that they had said something like that. I couldn't believe that people thought so lowly of me. To think that my husband, who I was so obviously so desperately in love with, would just be forgotten to Gale within moments? Absolutely not. I adored Gale, that much was true, but I wouldn't have just forgotten about Cato. Not now and likely not ever. They really must not have understood love. Or maybe they thought that they understood it too well.

"To think so easily that I would just cast Cato off? Gale is my best friend and has been my hunting partner for years. You honestly think that I would sell Cato out like that?" I asked nastily.

"I don't think that I really care what yours and Cato's relationship is. You're free to do whatever you would like behind closed doors," Coin said, not particularly unkindly.

But that didn't stop her words from bothering me. "It's nice to know how highly you think of the Mockingjay," I growled.

"I seem to recall that you saying that no one decent ever wins the Games," Coin said, still not unkindly.

My hands were shaking as a thin line of sweat broke out on my forehead. "Continue, Aspen. Please. This conversation is one to be had in private, between those involved. We are not involved," Seneca said, obviously sensing my discomfort.

Sending him a quick and grateful nod, I tried to focus back on the task at hand. But it wasn't easy. In fact, I was rattled by the turn in the conversation. The implications that I could so readily dispose of Cato, that I was in love with Gale, that the whole thing had been an act. My cheeks began to burn. The very notion that I was devoting any thought to who I wanted presented as my lover, given our current circumstances, was demeaning. How could they even be thinking about something like that?

Who even cared about who my lover was right now? The only thing that mattered was that I was planning on becoming the Mockingjay. I was going to be the Mockingjay and work at ending the war. And, in the meantime, in my private time, I could think about Cato. He hadn't been wiped out of my mind. Far from it. From the moment that I had met him, he had always been on my mind, one way or another. Gale, too. But there was something so much bigger than the three of us and our romance right now.

So I let my anger propel me into my greatest demand. "When the war is over, if we've won, Cato will be pardoned," I demanded.

Now that time there was no argument. In fact, there was only dead silence. Katniss, Brutus, and Seneca were smirking. Obviously they were all going to tell me that it was the right thing to do. But they didn't speak. Not yet. I had to let everyone process it first. On my other side, I felt Gale's body tense. I guessed that I really should have told him before, but I wasn't sure how he would respond. Not when it involved Cato. I had a bad feeling that our tense friendship was about to make its return.

"No form of punishment will be inflicted," I continued suddenly. A new thought occurred to me. "The same goes for the other captured Tributes, Johanna and Enobaria."

My voice faltered slightly when I said Enobaria's name. It was a bad idea. It made my argument a tiny bit weaker. Because everyone knew that Enobaria and I had some bad blood between us. Frankly, I really didn't care about Enobaria, the vicious District 2 Tribute. In fact, I disliked her, hated her even, but it seemed wrong to leave her out. Plus there was the issue that she was Brutus's friend - who had helped me - and she had originally helped Cato in the first Games. It was only fair.

"Annie, too," I added suddenly, a little softer that time.

"No," Coin said flatly.

"Enobaria tried to kill you," Plutarch said.

And I'm better than her. But I didn't dare say that out loud. "Doesn't mean I'll let someone kill her. They all get immunity," I said sharply.

"No," Coin repeated.

"Yes," I shot back. "It's not their fault you abandoned them in the arena. Who knows what the Capitol's doing to them? They’re doing and saying whatever they can to survive."

"Individuals don’t make demands in Thirteen. They'll be tried with other war criminals and treated as the tribunal sees fit. Thank you," Coin said.

"They'll be granted immunity!" I felt myself taking a step forward, wanting to slam Coin's head against the table, my voice full and resonant. "You will personally pledge this in front of the entire population of District Thirteen and the remainder of Twelve. Soon. Today. It will be recorded for future generations. You will hold yourself and your government responsible for their safety, or you'll find yourself another Mockingjay!"

My words were so loud that no one even dared to move. They hadn't heard me like this before. Not in person. The only time that they might have heard anything like that was on camera. I noticed that Seneca and Brutus were giving me slow nods. Plutarch gave me the same look that he had during my private training session. The others were staring blankly, looking in between being impressed and unnerved. My words hung in the air for a long moment. I sensed that no one was going to speak, so I continued.

"And you can't afford that. Because if you could have found another Mockingjay you would have done so by now. Obviously you need me. No immunity for the Victors, no Mockingjay," I said brashly, quieter, but with a deadly bite to my words.

"That's her!" I heard Fulvia hiss to Plutarch.

Plutarch turned to look at Coin. "Isn't that who I promised you?" Plutarch asked her, pointing to me.

"Right there. With the costume, gunfire in the background, just a hint of smoke," Fulvia continued.

"Yes, that's what we want," Plutarch said under his breath.

They were all chattering away so that they could talk about me but they weren't even considering that I was standing right here. It was something that had become very familiar to me. They were talking about me making stupid videos. Not being a real fighter. The one thing I might have been good at. I wanted to glare at them, but I felt that it would be a mistake to turn my attention from Coin. I could see her tallying the cost of my ultimatum, weighing it against my possible worth.

"What do you say, President? You could issue an official pardon, given the circumstances. The boy..." Plutarch trailed off.

"He's of age. They both are," Coin said sharply.

We were. That was the problem. We were adults, responsible for our own actions. That was the problem. If it had been Katniss, or someone of the likes, they would have been able to get out of it. Because she was just a kid. She could have been given a way out of it. But I was an adult. So was Cato. That was the big problem. What were we supposed to do? We couldn't play the clueless little kids right now. Not the way that we had done after the knives in the first Games.

"Honestly? Who cares?" Seneca asked, stepping forward. "They're barely of age. Just two years. Hardly that. You know that you can play it many ways. Cato Hadley is attempting to protect his wife in any way that he can. Easy enough. He's trying to protect her and their unborn baby. Aspen lost her parents before she can even remember them. They're under stress and sickly. From the Games. From their own minds. Cato's sister is dead. It's easy enough to play it off."

I gave him a grateful nod. He really was on my side here. "And the people do love him. If there's anyone who can sway District 2 to join the fight, it's him. Or Aspen, if we can eventually get out a message," Plutarch said.

The room was silent for a long time as everyone tried to process what I was saying. I wanted Cato to be free of any punishment. I knew that it wasn't the real problem here. The real problem was that I was essentially threatening and forcing Coin's hand. I had been around President Snow long enough to understand that it was a problem. Coin didn't want to have to bend to any demands. But it didn't matter. She was going to bend to mine. It was important. And she needed me to be the Mockingjay.

This whole thing must have been annoying for her. Having a barely twenty-year-old girl sitting and demanding that she let her husband off the hook for nearly sabotaging the war efforts. But I knew that he didn't mean that. He was only saying what he was saying to keep himself alive. And to keep me alive. Playing me off as the deranged and nervous pregnant girl. Easy enough. Now I just needed her to agree. It took a while, but everyone eventually started nodding their consent. It left only Coin to say yes.

She was glaring at me and I was glaring back at her. "All right," Coin finally said. "But you'd better perform."

"I'll perform when you've made the announcement," I countered.

The two of us were glaring at each other again. Obviously neither one of us liked or trusted the other one very much. But we weren't fools, no matter what anyone else thought. We both knew the truth. Neither one of us could get what we wanted without the other. So we would have to play friends. I would have to be the Mockingjay to end her war. She would have to allow Cato and the others to walk free to get me to be the Mockingjay.

"We need to move and quickly. Things have become stressed since the interview was released," Seneca said, trying to distract from the tense air around the table.

"Madam President, we're losing ground because the people are losing heart. This is worth the risk. She's worth the risk. Pardons, tribunals, power of the people, it can all be the bedrock of the new Panem. But in wartime I think even the noblest of causes can be bent a little bit. Right?" Plutarch asked.

It turned out that Plutarch was right about one thing. We had to start working together to make our new Panem. We couldn't just fall back on the way that we once were. The way that we were right now. We had to start getting along with each other. We had to have some leniency with each other. With people trying to save the ones that we loved. He was right that we had to bend this cause. To get everyone to work together. It would help to have Cato here.

"Call a national security assembly during Reflection today. I'll make the announcement then," Coin finally ordered. I had to push back a grin. "Is there anything left on your list, Aspen?"

Yes. And it's the one thing that I know for a fact that you aren't going to give me. Obviously this was one thing that she wasn't going to give me. But I couldn't just not try. I wanted to be the one person who was going to get to slaughter Snow. I had to at least try. So I let out a deep breath and came to stand a few inches closer to Coin. They were all watching me curiously. My paper was crumpled into a ball in my right fist. I flattened the sheet against the table and read the rickety letters.

"Just one more thing. I kill Snow," I said.

My voice was hard and devoid of emotion as I remembered every conversation that I had been in with the President. The dance before the first Games, at my home in Victor's Village, during the Victory Tour, and at my wedding. Each of those moments, Snow had threatened me. None of them had been particularly nice moments. We had never had a nice conversation. But I had promised him that he wouldn't like the game that I played. And I was right. For the first time ever, I saw the hint of a smile on Coin's lips.

"Right now there are Peacekeepers surrounding you." I began to look around but Snow only laughed. "Don't bother looking for them. You won't see them. They've all had their guns on you. This entire night. Fingers on the trigger. They were waiting on my command to shoot. I haven't decided if I'll give the signal or not. That all depends on you."

"On me?" I asked.

"Yes. If you're willing to play by the rules. Are you?" Snow asked.

Was I willing to play by the rules? Had I ever really been willing to play by the rules? That hadn't been in my nature before. But people could change. So was I willing to play by the rules?

Yes. But this time we're playing by my rules.

"When the time comes, I'll flip you for it," Coin said.

Now it was my turn to smile. The corners of my lips turned upwards. I still didn't love Coin. I doubted that I would ever love her or even get along with her. But right now I felt that I might understand her. She might have had as much of a claim on Snow's life as I did. Maybe even more. And maybe, to be fair, she was right. I certainly didn't have the sole claim against Snow's life. There were a number of people who had a claim on his life. And I was reasonably sure that I could count on her getting the job done.

"Fair enough," I finally said.

As much as I would have loved to be the one to plunge a knife through his stomach or put an arrow through his eyes, I knew that I might have to get over it and just play the role that I was assigned. To be the Mockingjay. To get the chance to fight and end the Hunger Games and the Capitol's reign once and for all should have been good enough for me. In some ways it was. Coin's eyes had flickered to her arm, the clock that she was wearing. She, too, had a schedule to adhere to. Busier than anyone else's.

"I'll leave her in your hands, then, Plutarch," Coin said.

For a while she looked back to stare at me. I gave her a long look. Neither one of us trusted the other, but we were going to have to learn to work together. We gave each other a short nod. She exited the room, followed by her team, and I finally let out a deep breath that I had been holding. I had thought that she would say no to at least one of my requests but she had said yes to them all. Now came making the Mockingjay work. Now we were left with only Plutarch, Fulvia, Katniss, Gale, and myself.

"Excellent. Excellent," Plutarch said, sinking down in the chair, elbows on the table, rubbing his eyes. "You know what I miss? More than anything? Coffee."

"Well you can get it once we win," I grumbled.

"I hear that you like coffee, too," Plutarch said.

"Yeah. I do," I muttered.

The gazes that I got from Katniss and Gale reminded me that they didn't know much about the way that I was in the Capitol. They sometimes forgot that I had gotten used to life there. Being rich. It had always fascinated them but they hadn't wanted to think about it. They rarely drank the coffee. It was too bitter for them. They both liked tea. But I liked the taste. And Cato, only Cato, knew that I took it without any of the fancy Capitol fixings; sugar, cream, or any flavor. Just black.

"I ask you, would it be so unthinkable to have something to wash down the gruel and turnips?" Plutarch grumbled.

Gale and Katniss exchanged a repulsed look. "To be fair, the turnips and rest of the food is pretty gross," I mumbled.

"It's better than starving," Gale snarled.

"Remember, they're from the Capitol. They're not used to eating like this. Hardly any food and the food that you do have is just for keeping you alive. Not tasting good," I said.

"Are you defending them?" Gale asked.

"To be fair, they got me out of the arena alive," I said.

"We didn't think it would be quite so rigid here," Fulvia explained - speaking before Gale could continue barking about the Capitol rebels - to us as she massages Plutarch's shoulders. "Not in the higher ranks."

Suddenly even I felt the need to defend District 13. "They barely have anything. They can't use the land. They can only use what they have underground. Everything that they can grow underground, which isn't much. This isn't the Capitol. This place is even nicer than District 12 was," I said.

"That's pathetic," Fulvia said.

"That's what happens when you're not from the Capitol," I said.

It was just like the way that Coin would speak to me. It wasn't particularly unkind. It was just the way that she was speaking. It was just the way that she was raised. The way that we all spoke to each other; a little guarded, sometimes tense, and never completely trusting. It was what had come from being separated for all of these years by the Capitol. It was hard for us to be together like this all at once, trying to fight on the same side. The Hunger Games had done that much to us.

"Or at least there'd be the option of a little side action. I mean, even Twelve had a black market, right?" Plutarch asked, distracting me from my thoughts.

"Yeah, the Hob. It's where we traded," Gale explained.

"There, you see?" Plutarch said. "And look how moral you three are! Virtually incorruptible." Plutarch sighed as Katniss, Gale, and I exchanged another look. Moral? Incorruptible? My how very far from the truth that was. "Oh, well, wars don't last forever. So, glad to have you on the team."

Obviously that comment was directed at me. Gale and Katniss had already been on the team. They were just some of the few people who they had all been trying to get join me. But I had pretty much been refusing up until right now. I watched as Plutarch reached a hand out to the side, where Fulvia was already extending a large sketchbook bound in black leather. I raised a brow. I had a feeling that I had seen it before. It looked vaguely familiar.

"You know in general what we're asking of you, Aspen. I'm aware you have mixed feelings about participating. I hope this will help," Plutarch said.

A moment later Plutarch slid the sketchbook across to me. Now I was sure that I had seen it before. Was it something that Snow had sent for me? Something that could kill me? It's just a notebook, damn it. Don't be such a baby. Maybe I was a little more on edge than I had thought that I was. For a moment, I looked at it suspiciously. Plutarch and Fulvia were waiting patiently. I almost refused to look. Then curiosity got the better of me. Plus Katniss and Gale didn't look too concerned about it.

So I opened the cover to find a picture of myself, standing straight and strong, in a black uniform. My hand shot over my mouth. I was now glad that I had opened the notebook. Only one person could have designed the outfit, at first glance utterly utilitarian, at second a work of art. The swoop of the helmet, the curve to the breastplate, the slight fullness of the sleeves that allowed the white folds under the arms to show. In his hands, I was again a Mockingjay.

"Cinna," I whispered.

"Yes. He made me promise not to show you this book until you'd decided to be the Mockingjay on your own. Believe me, I was very tempted. Go on. Flip through," Plutarch said.

Of course not. Cinna had always wanted me to do whatever I wanted to do. Never what anyone else was telling me to do. My hand still over my mouth, I turned the pages slowly, seeing each detail of the uniform. The carefully tailored layers of body armor, the hidden weapons in the boots and belt, and the special reinforcements over my heart. On the final page, under a sketch of my Mockingjay pin, Cinna had written, I'm still betting on you.

"Now I'm not allowed to bet. But if I could, I'd bet on you."

"Remember, I'm still betting on you, Girl on Fire."

"He... He was always betting on me..." I said, my voice cracking and eyes watering.

"He believed in you," Gale said, placing a comforting hand on my shoulder.

"When did he..." I trailed off. My voice failed me.

"Let's see. Well, after the Quarter Quell announcement. A few weeks before the Games maybe? There are not only the sketches. We have your uniforms. Oh, and Beetee's got something really special waiting for you down in the armory. I won't spoil it by hinting," Plutarch said.

"You're going to be the best-dressed rebel in history," Gale said with a smile.

"You'll look only slightly less pretentious," Katniss teased.

They were both smiling, but I couldn't force myself to put a smile on my face. Because for now I was remembering seeing Cinna, beaten and bloody and eventually dead, on that screen yesterday. He had died for something that he believed it. For someone that he believed in. Me. Suddenly, I realized that Gale and Katniss had been holding out on me. Like Cinna, in the end, they had wanted me to make this decision all by myself with no one's help.

"You knew. Both of you," I said, halfway accusatory.

"Of course we did," Gale said.

"But it was your choice. The entire time," Katniss said.

"You made the right one," Gale said.

For the first time, I felt that I might have honestly actually made the right choice. "Our plan is to launch an Airtime Assault. To make a series of what we call propos - which is short for 'propaganda spots' - featuring you, and broadcast them to the entire population of Panem," Plutarch explained fully.

"How? The Capitol has sole control of the broadcasts," Gale said.

"But we have Beetee. About ten years ago, he essentially redesigned the underground network that transmits all the programming. He thinks there's a reasonable chance it can be done. Of course, we'll need something to air. So, Aspen, the studio awaits your pleasure." Plutarch turned to his assistant. "Fulvia?"

"Plutarch and I have been talking about how on earth we can pull this off. We think that it might be best to build you, our rebel leader, from the outside... in. That is to say, let's find the most stunning Mockingjay look possible, and then work your personality up to deserving it!" Fulvia said brightly.

"Thanks," I muttered.

Just one more person telling me how completely not charming I was. Not that I didn't know that. I had known that the entire time. I had always known that I wasn't a very friendly person. Gale and Katniss had told me that enough times. And they weren't very friendly either. At least this time it wasn't about playing to a public eye. This time it was about playing a ruthless rebellion leader. At least I would get to play myself a little more than I usually did. But that didn't mean that I wouldn't be done up.

"You already have her uniform," Gale said.

"Yes, but is she scarred and bloody? Is she glowing with the fire of rebellion? Just how grimy can we make her without disgusting people? At any rate, she has to be something. I mean, obviously this," Fulvia moved in on me quickly, framing my face with her hands, "won't cut it."

Just like the rest of the Capitol people. They never really thought about everything that they wanted to say. They said what they meant and didn't bother thinking about what it meant to the person that they were speaking to. There was no hurt in me though. Maybe a little annoyance, as always, but I was so used to dealing with the Prep Team by now. I jerked my head back reflexively from her grasp but she was already busy gathering her things.

"Oh, thank you," I growled.

"So, with that in mind, we have another little surprise for you. Come, come," Fulvia said.

For a moment my feet were frozen. Fulvia did remind me very much of Effie in her own, strange, way. But Fulvia clearly didn't like me nearly as much as Effie did. And that was saying something, considering that Effie didn't always like me anyways. But I did miss her. I sincerely hoped that nothing terrible had happened to her since the end of the Quell. Fulvia gave us a wave, and Gale, Katniss, and I followed her and Plutarch out into the hall.

"So well intended, and yet so insulting," Gale whispered in my ear.

"Welcome to the Capitol," I whispered back.

"Do they always say things like that?" Katniss asked.

"Always," I said.

There was no way that they would ever change. Maybe if we decimated the Capitol and left it to be rebuilt, like District 12, but I didn't want anyone to experience what I had during my visit to my home. Besides, it really didn't matter. Because Fulvia's words had no effect on me. Instead I wrapped my arms tightly around the sketchbook and allowed myself to feel hopeful. Becoming the Mockingjay must have been the right decision. If Cinna had wanted it.

As we walked down the halls, I spotted the Hadley's walking towards what was sure to be their next assignment. "Oh," Alana started, spotting me, "Aspen -"

"We're busy! She can chat a little later," Plutarch called back.

"It worked!" I shouted, motioning for them to follow me for as long as they could. "I made the deal. Coin is going to announce during Reflection today that all of the Victors will be immune to trial. Dean, Skye, and Julie, you three are going to be able to come hunting with me. And Felix and Marcus, you're going to be allowed to start training!"

Plutarch was pulling on my shoulder. "Come on, now," he said.

"Well done, Aspen!" Carrie called.

"Good job," Damien said happily.

"We'll talk later," I said.

It was a good deal. I had managed to save their son, brother, and friend. At least, I had tried my absolute hardest, short of getting into the Capitol to get him back. That much would come later, once we could actually infiltrate the Capitol. Despite the fact that I was trying to speak to the Hadley's, everyone in my own little party grabbed my shoulders and arms and started pulling me with them. We would have to talk later. In the meantime we boarded an elevator, and Plutarch checked his notes.

"Let's see. It's Compartment Three-Nine-Oh-Eight," he said.

Those must have been in some of the higher-leveled hallways. I knew that there was no way that we were going somewhere that everyone else could go. Lots of District 13 was actually cut off from all of the lower-level civilians. Which were most of them. Only Coin's most-trusted held levels of power. I watched out of the corner of my eyes as Plutarch pressed a button marked thirty-nine, but nothing happened. For a moment I wondered if Plutarch had known Coin for a long time.

"You must have to key it," Fulvia said.

Plutarch pulled a key attached to a thin chain from under his shirt and inserted it into a slot that I hadn't noticed before. So Coin definitely trusted him. Maybe there was a chance that one day I could trust her, too. But I wasn't much for trusting anyone. Not these days, not before the Games, and likely not ever. I wasn't sure that I could trust someone who had watched the Games happen for seventy-five years and done nothing. The doors suddenly slid shut.

"Ah, there we are," Plutarch said.

We were in the same one that I had been in when Boggs had first brought me from the hospital to meet with Coin. The elevator descended ten, twenty, thirty-plus levels, farther down than I even knew District 13 went. It made me a little sick to think about how far underground we were. It opened on a wide white corridor lined with red doors, which looked almost decorative compared to the gray ones on the upper floors. Each was plainly marked with a number. 3901, 3902, 3903...

Now I was desperate to know where we were going. I had been kept out of the loop for long enough. As we stepped out, I glanced behind me to watch the elevator close and saw a metallic grate slide into place over the regular doors. When I turned, a guard had materialized from one of the rooms at the far end of the corridor. High security here. Something was being kept under lock and key. A door swung silently shut behind him as he strode toward us, looking tense and irritable.

Plutarch moved to meet him, raising a hand in greeting, and the rest of us followed behind him. Something felt very wrong down here. It was more than the reinforced elevator, or the claustrophobia of being so far underground, or the caustic smell of antiseptic. Maybe it was because this place reminded me of the Stockyard and Catacombs. One look at Gale and Katniss's face and I could tell that they sensed it as well. Obviously something was wrong, because they didn't know what those places looked like.

"Where are we going?" I asked suspiciously.

"To meet an old friend," Plutarch said plainly.

"The only friends that I have are right here," I said.

Of course there was also Finnick, who was in the hospital, and the Hadley's and my own family, who were towards the upper levels of Thirteen. "Don't bet on that," Plutarch said.

"Trust me, I learned a long time ago to not make bets," I muttered.

A small grin formed on their faces. "Good morning, we were just looking for -" Plutarch began.

"You have the wrong floor," the guard said abruptly.

"Really?" Plutarch double-checked his notes, looking very confused. "I've got Three-Nine-Oh-Eight written right here. I wonder if you could just give a call up to -"

"I'm afraid I have to ask you to leave now. Assignment discrepancies can be addressed at the Head Office," the guard said.

His voice alerted me to something else. It was tense and warning. It meant that something was here that he really didn't want us to see. That meant that there was a big problem. The door that Plutarch was talking about was right ahead of us. Compartment 3908. Just a few steps away. The door - in fact, all the doors - seemed incomplete. No knobs. They must have swung free on hinges like the one the guard appeared through. Or the sliding ones in the Capitol.

"Where is that again?" Fulvia asked.

"You'll find the Head Office on Level Seven," the guard said, extending his arms to corral us back to the elevator.

From behind door 3908 came a sound. Just a tiny whimper. Like something a cowed dog might make to avoid being struck, only all too human and familiar. I knew that sound. It was someone in pain. And that voice. There was something almost a little familiar about it. But the last time that I had heard it, it had been a whimper of excitement. I had never heard one of pain. My eyes met Gale's for just a moment, but it was long enough for two people who operated the way that we did.

Katniss placed a hand on my back and I knew that she was already in on it. It would help to have the two of us working together with Gale as the background. The distraction. Perfect partners, as always. I suddenly let Cinna's sketchbook fall at the guard's feet with a loud bang. Everyone jumped as I awkwardly laughed apologetically. A second after he leaned down to retrieve it, Gale leaned down, too, intentionally bumping heads with him.

"Oh, I'm sorry," Gale said with a light laugh, catching the guard's arms as if to steady himself, turning him slightly away from me.

"Move!" I hissed at Katniss.

That was our chance. Definitely our only chance as the guards wouldn't like that we were directly disobeying orders, something that didn't go over very well in District 13. But I couldn't be bothered with punishment right now. So Katniss and I darted around the distracted guard, pushed open the door marked 3908, and stumbled inside. That was where I found them. My hand immediately clasped over my mouth. There they were. Half-naked, bruised, and shackled to the wall. My Prep Team.

Chapter 5: Chapter Five

The stink of unwashed bodies, stale urine, and infection broke through the cloud of antiseptic. For a moment I recoiled. The last time that I had smelled something like that, it had been after the first Games. The three figures were only just recognizable by their most striking fashion choices: Venia's gold facial tattoos. Flavius's orange corkscrew curls. Octavia's light evergreen skin, which now hung too loosely, as if her body were a slowly deflating balloon. Dehydration, I realized. Just like during my first Games.

It was easy enough to recognize the signs when I had become so familiar with them myself. But that wasn't my concern right now. My concern was just how horrified I was. I had never seen someone treated like this. At least, not in Thirteen. In the Capitol it happened, but it was hidden away. It happened in District 12, but only after Thread had taken over. My stomach lurched painfully at the sight of my stupid little pets. My ever-affectionate Prep Team. The people who had always adored me.

They had annoyed me a number of times over the past year, but they had never been genuinely cruel to me. And they were so stupid. How could someone have done something like that to such simpleminded creatures? On seeing me, Flavius and Octavia shrank back against the tiled walls like they were anticipating an attack, even though I had never hurt them. Unkind thoughts were my worst offense against them, and those I kept to myself, so why did they recoil? I would never have hurt them.

With a quick motion to Katniss, she went to helping them. Making sure that they were okay. They could barely look at her. The guard was ordering the two of us out, but by the shuffling that followed, I knew that Gale had somehow detained him. As always, he was helping me without question. For answers, I crossed to Venia, who was always the strongest. I crouched down and took her icy hands, which clutched onto mine like vises. I gently ran my thumb over her bruised knuckles.

"What happened, Venia? What are you doing here?" I asked.

"They took us. From the Capitol," she said hoarsely.

"They?" I asked.

"Aspen -" Venia sobbed.

Anything else that she was going to say died in her throat. "It's okay. It's going to be okay. I'll help you. All of you. You're going to be fine," I whispered, pushing back her hair.

"We just..." Venia tried.

She was still sobbing. Katniss was trying to calm down Flavius and Octavia in the meantime. "It's okay. We'll get you out of here and then you can explain, okay?" I said.

Plutarch entered behind me. "What on earth is going on?" he asked.

Like you don't know. "Who took you?" I pressed Venia.

"People," Venia said vaguely. "The night you broke out."

"People? Plutarch?" I asked.

"No," Venia said.

"Do you know who?" I asked.

"I'm not sure," Venia said.

She was still crying. She needed to get out of here and get some real food in her. They all looked bone thin. "Okay. Don't worry about anything. I'm going to get you out of here. I promise," I whispered.

"We thought it might be comforting for you to have your regular team," Plutarch said from behind me.

Immediately I released my grip on Venia and whirled around on Plutarch. "This is supposed to be comforting? This is worse than something that the Capitol could do!" I shouted loudly, my voice echoing around the room.

"We weren't aware of this," Plutarch said, maybe in a manner that he thought was comforting.

"You're torturing them," I hissed.

"Well they are here," Plutarch said awkwardly.

"This is worse than being there!" I shouted, waving to the Prep Team.

"Cinna requested it," Plutarch explained.

"Cinna requested this?" I snarled.

Absolutely not. He would have never done something like that. Cinna was a kind soul, no matter what was happening. And I knew that he felt the exact same way about the Prep Team that I did. Exasperated with their constant chatter and love of the Games, but still held some fondness for them and their love of us. If there was one thing that I knew, it was that Cinna would never have approved the abuse of these three, who he had always somehow managed with gentleness and patience. Even when I hadn't.

"Why are they being treated like criminals?" I asked sharply.

"I honestly don't know," Plutarch said.

There had to be someone who would know. That was when it dawned on me. Seneca had said that there was something that he wanted to talk to me about. Was there a chance that he had been referring to this? The awful treatment of my Prep Team. Plutarch seemed genuinely confused about their treatment and no one else had said anything about them. So maybe that was what he was trying to say yesterday.

"What the hell is this?" I barked at the guard. He shook his head. "I need to speak with Seneca Crane. Now!"

Gale finally entered the room. "Aspen, are you -?"

"Now," I cut him off, unsure of whether I was speaking to Plutarch or the guard. "He'll know what's going on."

"When you have time. Not right now. We're going to get this sorted," Plutarch said determinedly.

Whipping back around to him, I gave him a scrutinizing glare. Was there a chance that he really did know what was going on? For a while I just stared at him. But I realized that there was something in his voice that genuinely made me believe him, and the pallor on Fulvia's face confirmed it. He actually wasn't lying to me. He had no idea what was going on with the Prep Team. Plutarch turned to the guard, who had just appeared again in the doorway with Gale right behind him.

"I was only told they were being confined. Why are they being punished?" Plutarch asked.

"For stealing food. We had to restrain them after an altercation over some bread," the guard said.

"All of this for a damned piece of bread?" I snarled, remembering the time that I took a whipping for the younger girl.

"Stealing is punishable by -" Plutarch started.

"This is ridiculous!" I shouted, interrupting him. I turned around and faced Fulvia and Plutarch. "For people who claim to be so much better than the Capitol."

Venia's brows came together as if she was still trying to make sense of it. She was the only one who could manage herself right now. "No one would tell us anything. We were so hungry. It was just one slice she took," Venia said.

Octavia began to sob, muffling the sound in her ragged tunic. My stomach roiled in pain at the thought of my pathetic little Prep Team being hurt this badly after being 'rescued' for me. I thought of how, the first time that I survived the arena, Octavia sneaked me a roll under the table because she couldn't bear my hunger. It happened right after they were remaking me when I was starving and they wouldn't feed me until after the Closing Ceremony. I crawled across to her shaking form.

"It's okay, Octavia. You'll be okay," I whispered.

"Just stay calm. We're going to get them out of here," Plutarch advised me.

"Octavia?" I asked. She was whimpering and not speaking to me. I touched her and she flinched. "Octavia? It's going to be all right. I'll get you out of here, okay?"

"This seems extreme," Plutarch said.

"It's because they took a slice of bread?" Gale asked.

"There were repeated infractions leading up to that. They were warned. Still they took more bread." The guard paused a moment, as if puzzled by our density. "You can't take bread."

Irritably I took a step forward and motioned to the three chained up Capitol citizens. "This is a type of punishment for murder, not for stealing a slice of bread for people who aren't used to having so little to eat. Would a nice talking-to have been too little?" I asked harshly.

"It's against the rules," the guard argued.

"That doesn't make it okay," I hissed, looking back at the Prep Team. "Octavia... Please, look at me."

No matter how hard I tried, it was clear that Octavia was far too afraid to move. Which would definitely be a problem. More than once I tried to pry her hands away from her face, but I didn't want to scare or hurt her even more than she already had been. I couldn't get Octavia to uncover her face no matter what I did, but she eventually lifted it slightly. The shackles on her wrists shifted down a few inches, revealing raw sores beneath them.

"You're going to be okay," I whispered to them.

"Can you fix this?" Venia whimpered.

"No. But I know someone who can," I said determinedly.

"Mom?" Katniss asked.

"Yes. I'm bringing you to my mother." I wasn't really sure who I was talking to, but they needed to know that I wasn't going to leave them in here. Then I addressed the guard. "Unchain them," I growled.

The guard shook his head. "It's not authorized," he said.

"Unchain them! Now!" I yelled.

Obviously my words surprised him. Not just him. It surprised all of the people in the room. Katniss and Gale had never heard me use my authoritative voice, considering that I didn't use it that often. Fulvia and Plutarch were used to the depressed and practically catatonic version of me. The Prep Team flinched slightly. They were used to me trying to butter them up. It definitely broke the composure of the guard. Average citizens didn't address him this way. But I wasn't average.

"I have no release orders," the guard started. "And you have no authority to -"

"Mockingjay," I muttered to Plutarch.

"Do it on my authority. We came to collect these three anyway. They're needed for Special Defense. I'll take full responsibility," Plutarch explained.

"Thanks," I whispered.

The guard left the cell to make the call. He returned a moment later with a set of keys. The prep team had been forced into cramped body positions for so long that even once the shackles were removed, they had trouble walking. Gale, Plutarch, Katniss and I had to help them. Flavius's foot caught on a metal grate over a circular opening in the floor, and my stomach contracted when I thought of why a room would need a drain. The stains of human misery that must have been hosed off these white tiles.

"You'll be okay. I promise. It's going to be fine," I whispered to them.

They hadn't even done monstrous things like that to me back in the Capitol. They had done everything that they had in the Games, but nothing like this. The eight of us slowly made our way out of the room and back into the hallways. I was well aware that there were a number of people watching us as we walked, curious as to what had happened. But we didn't stop to chat just like they didn't stop to offer their help. Something that did actually surprise me. I would have thought that someone would offer.

Maybe it was because they recognized that the people Katniss, Gale, Plutarch, and I were carrying were from the Capitol. Maybe they couldn't be bothered to care because they didn't care about the people who they blamed for trapping them down here. Or maybe there was the awful chance that they were just as cruel as the people back in the Capitol were. Because none of them - not here or in the Capitol - could really be brought to care about the others.

As we continued walking through the halls, desperate to get back to the hospital and get Ms. Everdeen to help us with the Prep Team, I noticed that a number of people had stopped what they were doing to watch us curiously. But you couldn't offer us a damn hand, could you? That was when I spotted Cato's family rushing forward to see what had happened. They looked terrified at the sight of the Prep Team as they pushed through the crowd.

"Oh... That's your Prep Team, isn't it?" Alana asked.

"Yes," I said.

"What's happened?" Alana asked.

"They were chained up for stealing a piece of bread. They were brought here from the Capitol after the Games," I explained as simply as possible, continuing to walk.

"Are they okay?" Damien asked, looking at the three.

"I think so but I'm no doctor," I said.

"Come on. Let's get them help," Julie said, taking some of Flavius's weight from Plutarch.

"Where are you going?" Dean called.

"The hospital. My mother will know what to do," I shouted back.

"Okay. We'll help," Carrie said, pushing open the doors ahead of us.

"Aidan, take Marley back to the compartment. Okay?" Alana asked her son.

"Okay. Hope they're alright," Aidan told me.

"Thanks," I said.

The moment that he was off with his niece, our large group continued moving through the hallways. We were rushing past and practically trampling the people who were in our way. But I was desperate to get the Prep Team some help. I knew that they were in no danger of dying - they weren't that badly injured, more exhausted and hungry - but that didn't mean that I didn't want to help them. They weren't used to any type of pain, more than plucking their eyebrows.

Once we finally arrived in the hospital, I immediately found Ms. Everdeen, the only person who I trusted to care for them. It took her a minute to place the three, given their current condition, but already she wore a look of consternation. And I knew that it wasn't just a result of seeing abused bodies, because they were her daily fare in District 12, but the realization that this sort of thing went on in Thirteen as well.

Ms. Everdeen was welcomed into the hospital upon arrival, but she was viewed as more of a nurse than a doctor, despite her lifetime of healing. Mostly because she had no professional training. Still, no one interfered when she guided the trio into an examination room to assess their injuries. I planted myself on a bench in the hall outside the hospital entrance, waiting to hear her verdict. She would be able to read in their bodies the pain inflicted upon them.

Gale sat next to me and put an arm around my shoulder. "She'll fix them up," he consoled.

"I know. They're just not used to treatment like that," I muttered.

"They're going to be okay," Katniss said, placing a hand on my knee. "They just need some time."

Unable to bring myself to speak again, I gave a nod, wondering if he was thinking about his own brutal flogging back in District 12. Or maybe even mine. The two of us knew exactly what it felt like. We knew what it was like to be so brutally treated by the people whom you might have once called family. At least Thread hated everyone. I had been shocked when old Cray had hit me. Although that shouldn't have surprised me. I had stepped in for someone else, after all. I had forced his hand.

Cato's family took spots on either side of Katniss and Gale, who were placed at my sides. Skye and Julie sat down on the floor in front of us. It was the most people that I had seen in the hospital at once. Plutarch and Fulvia took the bench across from us but didn't offer any comments on the state of my Prep Team. If they had no knowledge of the mistreatment, then what did they make of this move on President Coin's part? I decided to help them out.

"I guess we've all been put on notice," I said.

"What? No. What do you mean?" Fulvia asked.

"Punishing my Prep Team is a warning. Not just to me. But to you, too. About who's really in control and what happens if she's not obeyed. If you had any delusions about having power, I'd let them go now. Apparently, a Capitol pedigree is no protection here. Maybe it's even a liability," I told them.

"There is no comparison between Plutarch, who masterminded the rebel breakout, and those three beauticians," Fulvia said icily, shooting me a spiteful look.

Carelessly I shrugged. "If you say so, Fulvia. But what would happen if you got on Coin's bad side? My Prep Team was kidnapped. They can at least hope to one day return to the Capitol. Gale, Katniss, and I can live in the woods. But you? Where would you two run?" I asked irritably.

"Perhaps we're a little more necessary to the war effort than you give us credit for," Plutarch said, unconcerned.

"Of course you are. The Tributes were necessary to the Games, too. Until they weren't. And then we were very disposable - right, Plutarch?" I asked.

That ended the conversation. Everyone simply sat in silence as we waited for news of what had happened to the Prep Team. My gaze stayed firmly locked on the ground. There was nothing that I wanted to deal with right now and no one that I wanted to listen to. I just had to make sure that they were okay. The people whom I had hated so much when I had first arrived at the Capitol were now under my protection. They were family, in their own strange way. A while later Ms. Everdeen found us.

"They'll be all right. No permanent physical injuries," she reported.

"Good. Splendid. How soon can they be put to work?" Plutarch asked.

"Put to work?" I repeated.

"Taking care of you," Plutarch explained.

"Pleasant," I growled.

"Probably tomorrow. You'll have to expect some emotional instability, after what they've been through. They were particularly ill prepared, coming from their life in the Capitol," Ms. Everdeen explained.

"Weren't we all?" Plutarch said.

"I don't recall seeing you chained up in one of the back rooms," I growled.

"That doesn't mean that I'm any more prepared to be here," Plutarch defended.

"Funny. I was about to say the same thing," I snapped back.

"Alright, enough," Katniss said, stepping between us.

Either because the Prep Team were incapacitated or I was too on edge, Plutarch released me from Mockingjay duties for the rest of the day. Gale, Katniss, the Hadley's, and I headed down to lunch, where we were served bean and onion stew, a thick slice of bread, and a cup of water. After Venia's story, the bread stuck in my throat, so I slid the rest of it onto Gale's tray. None of us spoke much during lunch, but when our bowls were clean, Gale pulled up his sleeve, revealing his schedule.

"I've got training next," Gale said.

When was the last time that I even checked my schedule? A long damn time. I tugged up my sleeve and held my arm next to his. "Me, too," I said.

That was when I remembered that training equaled hunting now. Katniss rolled up her sleeve and held it next to ours. "Me, three," she agreed.

"Let's go!" I chirped.

My eagerness to escape into the woods, if only for two hours, overrode my current concerns. An immersion into greenery and sunlight would surely help me sort out my thoughts. Of which there were a number. Once off the main corridors, Gale, Katniss, and I raced like schoolchildren for the armory. The last time that I had ran like this... for fun... I couldn't even remember. It was freeing. By the time we arrived, I was breathless and dizzy. A reminder that I wasn't fully recovered from the electrical blast.

The guards provided our old weapons, as well as knives and a burlap sack that was meant for a game bag. I tolerated having the tracker clamped to my ankle (which was bulky and heavy), tried to look as if I was listening when they explained how to use the handheld communicator. The only thing that stuck in my head was that it had a clock, and we must be back inside Thirteen by the designated hour or our hunting privileges would be revoked. That was one rule I thought that I would make an effort to abide.

"I'm going to come back out next hour," I said as we prepared to leave.

"Why?" Gale asked.

"Because I want to take Dean out and show him around," I said.

"And what about us?" Gale snapped.

"We're getting our own hour," Katniss interrupted, clearly trying to diffuse a fight before it could start. "Wait a second. What do you have after this?"

"I don't know. I'm not so good with watching my timing," I admitted.

"You really sure that you want to come out there with him?" Gale asked.

"Yes. I'm absolutely sure. I want to go out," I said.

"I'm pretty sure that she can have an arrow through his eyes in a heartbeat if he does anything to her," Katniss pointed out.

"Alright. Just be careful," Gale warned.

"Always am," I said, which wasn't at all true.

In reality, I was just about anything but careful. Katniss stepped forward and placed herself in between us. "It's fine. We'll come out again tomorrow and stay out for the full hour. Just the three of us. Right?" Katniss asked us both, obviously daring us to give her a different answer.

"Right," I agreed. Before we turned to leave, I moved back to one of the guards. "Excuse me? Can you send a message to Dean Hadley? Tell him to come here in an hour. We're going hunting."

"Of course," the guard said.

"Thank you," I called.

"Whose bow is he going to borrow?" Gale asked.

There came the major issue. "Well..." I trailed off, giving Gale a hopeful look.

He scowled at me. "Come on, Gale. Let him borrow it," Katniss goaded.

"What about yours?" Gale snapped at her.

Katniss rolled her eyes and motioned down to her wooden bow. "Mine is designed for someone my size." Katniss was bigger than me, but Dean was much bigger than her. "It won't work for someone Dean's size. Who is just about your size," she argued.

"Please, Gale? Come on. I won't let him hurt it," I said sweetly.

"Sure. Fine. Whatever," Gale growled.

"Thank you," I chirped.

He didn't look thrilled with letting Dean use his bow, but he didn't argue the subject any further. Without another word the three of us went outside into the large, fenced-in training area beside the woods. Guards opened the well-oiled gates without comment. We would have been hard-pressed to get past the fence on our own - thirty feet high and always buzzing with electricity, topped with razor-sharp curls of steel. We moved through the woods until the view of the fence had been obscured.

It was exhilarating to be back in the woods. A place that had originally been my solace, then been a place of nightmares, and was now once more my escape. It was strange how much my view on something as simple as the woods had changed in just a year. In a small clearing, we paused and dropped back our heads to bask in the sunlight. I turned in a circle slowly with Katniss next to me, our arms extended at our sides, revolving slowly so as not to set the world spinning.

Being out in the woods had never been so peaceful. So wonderful. Even with the damage that I saw here. The lack of rain I saw in Twelve had damaged the plants here as well, leaving some with brittle leaves, building a crunchy carpet under our feet. We took off our shoes to keep them from crunching. Mine didn't fit right anyway, since in the spirit of waste-not-want-not that rules Thirteen, I was issued a pair someone had outgrown. Apparently, one of us walks funny, because they were broken in all wrong.

We hunted, like in the old days. Silent, needing no words to communicate, because here in the woods we moved as three parts of one being. Anticipating each other's movements, watching each other's backs. How long had it been? Eight months? Nine? Since we had this freedom? It wasn't exactly the same, given all that had happened and the trackers on our ankles and the fact that I had to rest so often after that nasty electrocution. But it was about as close to happiness as I figured that I could currently get.

At least until Cato arrived. For now it wasn't half-bad. Hunting kept my mind off of what had happened with him. The animals here were not nearly suspicious enough. That extra moment it took to place our unfamiliar scent meant their death. It would be easy to train Dean in these woods. In an hour and a half, we had gotten a mixed dozen - rabbits, squirrels, and turkeys - and decided to spend the remaining time by a pond that must have been fed by an underground spring, since the water was cool and sweet.

When Gale offered to clean the game, I didn't object. It had never been my favorite part. Since we were no longer hunting, the three of us exchanged idle chitchat as we laid about. I stuck a few mint leaves on my tongue, closed my eyes, and leaned back against a rock, soaking in the sounds, letting the scorching afternoon sun burn my skin, almost at peace. Almost... If only Cato was here. Just like that day up on the roof. The peace only lasted until Gale's voice interrupted me.

"Aspen, why do you care so much about your Prep Team?" Gale asked.

"It was nice while it lasted," Katniss sighed.

The two of us were both leaning up against the rocks and basking in the sunlight. For a moment I wished that we were in the warmer air of the Capitol. Just for a moment, though. Deciding that I couldn't avoid his comment forever, I opened my eyes to see if he was joking. But it was Gale and I should have known that he was being completely serious. I knew because he was frowning down at the rabbit he was skinning.

"Why shouldn't I?" I asked.

"Hm. Let's see. Because they've spent the last year prettying you up for slaughter?" Gale suggested.

"They're really not that bad. They've been nice to me before and they really like Prim," Katniss defended.

Like me, she wasn't going to stand for someone as pathetic and clueless as the Prep Team to be hurt. "After they offered her up for slaughter?" Gale asked.

"They don't get it, Gale," I said, knowing that Prim's Reaping was still sensitive with Katniss.

"If I don't have a problem with them, you really shouldn't either," Katniss argued.

It was a good point. If there was anyone here who deserved to hate the Capitol just as much as I did, it was Katniss, whose sister had been the start to all of this. Not that I ever faulted Prim for it. She hadn't made me do everything that I had done in the Capitol. That had been my own fault. But, to be fair, it was her name being pulled that sent me into the Games in the first place.

"I remember them in the Capitol. They were so excited for the wedding. They didn't even think that you were going into the Games in two days," Gale argued.

"We're not the same kind of people. It's different for them," I said.

"You're defending them," Gale said disbelievingly.

"It's more complicated than that. I know them. They're not evil or cruel. They're not even smart. Hurting them, it's like hurting children. They don't see... I mean, they don't know..." I tried.

As usual, I got knotted up in my words. Words had never been my forte. As much as I tried to speak and make myself sound eloquent and not like I was the twenty-year-old fool that I was, it never worked. I always sounded like a teenager trying to be an adult. Something that I very clearly wasn't. Gale was scowling at me. Obviously he didn't like that I was defending them. Katniss seemed to understand my point.

"They don't know what, Aspen? That Tributes - who are the actual children involved here, not your trio of freaks - are forced to fight to the death?" Gale asked.

"Knock it off. They know about the kids," I snapped.

"Obviously they don't," Gale said. "Did they even care about R -"

Gale immediately stopped speaking. His voice dropped off so quickly that I would have found it comical had it been any other day. Had it been anything else that he was about to say. But I knew exactly what he was going to say. It was too late to take it back. I saw the guilt building in Gale's eyes. He could be a little on the cruel side at times but even Gale knew that, after all of this time, it still wasn't fair to drag Rue into an argument. But my eyes watered anyways, even though I knew that he hadn't meant it.

"They didn't know her. They didn't know about her," I said, my voice cracking.

"But they knew that the Games were about to happen," Gale said, his voice not as stern now.

"It's just like being in District 2. Everything depends on the place that you grew up. If you were from the Capitol you would have been raised on the Games," Katniss argued.

"Well I wasn't," Gale said.

"Well they are," I snapped.

"Cinna didn't like them," Gale reasoned.

"His parents were from the Districts," I said.

Both of their heads snapped over to me. "They were?" Katniss asked, surprised.

Had I never told them that story? I supposed that I hadn't. "Yeah. District 8. Textile workers. The Capitol brought them when they were twenty-one. They raised Cinna to know the truth about what happened in the Districts," I explained.

They were silent for a little while before Gale started to shake his head. "Doesn't make a difference. They should know the difference between right and wrong," Gale snapped.

"They don't. It's just the way that it is. They don't understand," I said.

"That you were going into that arena for people's amusement? Was that a big secret in the Capitol?" Gale asked.

"No. But they don't view it the way we do," I said. "They're raised on it and -"

"Are you actually defending them?" Gale interrupted.

The irritation was clear in both Gale's voice and actions. He slipped the skin from the rabbit in one quick move. It was the fastest that I had ever seen him move. He hated the Capitol more than anything. He couldn't stop for one second to think that they weren't all the monsters that everyone in District 13 thought that they were. They didn't understand that there were some good ones. But that was when I realized that it stung, because, in fact, I was, and it was ridiculous. I struggled to find a logical position.

"I guess I'm defending anyone who's treated like that for taking a slice of bread. Maybe it reminds me too much of what happened to you over a turkey! Or me, for that girl," I barked loudly.

If there were any animals around in the area, I had definitely just scared them off. Katniss was watching the two of us closely. She had always been there to diffuse our fights after my first go-round in the arena. She used to get involved in them, but now she tried to keep us from imploding on ourselves. As I thought back to our injuries, I realized that I hadn't seen that girl since I had arrived in District 13. She was likely killed in the bombing. I saved her and then I killed her.

As angry as I was with Gale about everything, I had to realize something. He was right. It did seem strange, my level of concern over the Prep Team. The people who had always driven me insane during my brief periods of time in the Capitol. I should have hated them and wanted to see them strung up. But they were so clueless about everything, and I genuinely believed that they did care about me, and they belonged to Cinna, and he was on my side, right?

"I'm not looking for a fight. But I don't think Coin was sending you some big message by punishing them for breaking the rules here. She probably thought you'd see it as a favor," Gale said.

"I somehow doubt that. She hates me," I said.

"True. But she still probably thought that she was helping you," Gale said, shrugging.

"Oh, yes. That was very helpful," I snapped.

Gale's head turned to look at me. He raised his eyebrows in surprise. "You actually care about them," Gale said slowly.

"Yes. I genuinely do. And I know that they care about me, too," I growled.

The two of us stared at each other for a few seconds. I knew that they cared about me. They had made it obvious. Perhaps they were a little off and showed their love in a strange way, being from the Capitol and so closely tied to the Games, but I genuinely believed that they - just like Cinna - had always cared for me in some way or another. Just like Effie did. Gale finally turned away and stuffed the rabbit in the sack before rising to his feet.

"We better get going if we want to make it back on time," Gale said.

"Fine," I growled.

The two of us glared at each other again. But Gale had always been the one who could get over arguments. I was the one who would stay angry with him until he offered an apology that I found suitable. Gale leaned down and offered Katniss a hand up. She easily bounced back to her feet as Gale turned back to me and gave me his hand. But I ignored his offer of a hand up and got to my feet unsteadily. That damned concussion and electrocution were still getting to me, even after almost a month.

"Well that was a good trip," Katniss said, letting out a breath.

"Almost reminds me of the good old days," I muttered.

"Fighting constantly? Yes. That seems very familiar," Katniss joked.

It was enough just to barely make the three of us smile at each other. But it didn't last very long. Just long enough for the three of us to ensure that the fight wouldn't get escalated anymore. Definitely not something that I needed right now. Not something that any of us needed with our friendship on such strained terms. None of us talked on the way back, but once we were inside the gate - as I pushed myself to keep walking even through the exhaustion - I thought of something else.

"During the Quarter Quell, Octavia and Flavius had to quit because they couldn't stop crying over me going back in. And Venia could barely say goodbye," I said.

"I'll try and keep that in mind as they... remake you," Gale growled.

"Do," I snapped.

"Hey," Katniss said, stepping in between the two of us and shoving us backwards. "Knock it off. Come on. Let's go show off the deliveries."

"Great," I muttered.

As we headed out, I had to follow Katniss and Gale. I didn't have a clue where the kitchen was, but they did. Clearly they had been before. We handed the meat over to Greasy Sae in the kitchen. She apparently liked District 13 well enough, as I spent a while speaking with her, even though she thought that the cooks were somewhat lacking in imagination. But a woman who came up with a palatable wild dog and rhubarb stew was bound to feel as if her hands were tied here.

"I'm gonna go out hunting with Dean," I said as we left.

"Here," Gale said, pushing his bow into my chest.

"Thanks," I said, watching him storm off.

Back to square one... I coughed gently as I slung his bow back over my shoulders, running the opposite way of my own. I had been forced to leave the arrows in the armory. "You want me to come out with you?" Katniss asked.

For a moment I thought about taking her up on it. But I eventually shook my head. "I think I need to be with him alone for a while. There are some things that the two of us need to say to each other," I said.

"Okay. Have fun out there."

"Thanks." As the two of us headed back out into the main hallway, I looked over at her. "Can you... I don't know. Talk to Gale?" I asked awkwardly.

These days it seemed that Gale would rather chat with Katniss. "I'll try and get him to see it the right way," she promised.

"Thank you. I'm sick of fighting with him."

"You two were doing so well for a while. What happened?"

"We found out that Cato is alive," I said blankly.

"Aspen..." Katniss trailed off.

"It's fine, Cat. It really is. Gale and I... After the first Games I should have known that the two of us would never be able to go back to that old friendship that we had," I said, remembering that one stupid action that had changed everything. That one damned kiss. "After he kissed me -"

"What?" Katniss interrupted loudly.

That was when I realized that I had never told her about that kiss. I had never told her about any of those kisses. "I forgot that I never told you that," I muttered.

"What are you talking about?" Katniss asked, her voice sounding strained.

"It was the reason that I was so torn throughout the Games. Kill Cato or be with him. If I was with him it was more than just the knowledge that I would have to kill him at the end of the Games and be heartbroken without him. There was guilt there," I tried to explain.

"Because of Gale?" Katniss asked.

"Yeah."

"Did you know about his crush?"

"Kind of. When he came to say goodbye to me we chatted back and forth. He was trying to comfort me. I was trying to reassure him that I would be fine. I told him about my concern that there were twenty-four of us and only one came out. He told me that it was going to be me. Then he kissed me. I was so stunned that I didn't kiss him back until the Peacekeepers pulled him out of the room. He told me that he loved me and..." I trailed off, feeling horrible about what had happened.

"And when you came back a month later you were in love with someone else," Katniss said, easily filling in the blanks.

"Yes."

"Now I get it. Now I get why the two of you have been so tense around each other. I didn't know about the kiss," Katniss said as the two of us stopped walking and lingered in an outcropping.

"I know. I figured that Gale didn't tell you," I said.

"Why didn't you tell me that?

"I don't know. I just... I felt guilty about it and the more people knew... the more that I would be concerned that something would happen between us... and..."

"Then you would have to choose between them."

"Yes. And I can't do that. I can't pick between them."

"I think you already have," Katniss pointed out.

She was right. I had already picked which one I wanted. But that didn't change the fact that I was afraid the other would leave me. "But I don't want to leave Gale behind. I just keep thinking that if I go on in my life with Cato, once we get him back, Gale won't want anything to do with me," I admitted.

"I don't think it matters who you choose in the end. He loves you. He'll want to be with you," Katniss said.

Rolling my eyes, I crossed my arms over my chest. "It just makes me feel so guilty. The entire thing. Even when I know that he's trying not to make me feel guilty," I said.

"He'll stand by you no matter who you pick in the end. It'll be easy for you. Don't worry about him," Katniss said.

We stood in silence for a few moments before I remembered one of the things that I wanted to speak with her about. "Why did you show Gale the letter that I wrote you?" I asked.

"I - I don't know," Katniss stuttered, looking very guilty. "I just needed to talk with someone about it and you weren't anywhere to be found. And I knew that it was too dangerous to talk about it in the Capitol."

"You were right about that," I said.

"Do you trust him?" Katniss asked, referring to Seneca.

"Yes. As much as I wish that I didn't, I do," I said honestly.

"What happened?" Katniss asked.

That horrible memory... "It - It was the night that Cato proposed to me. Seneca brought me back to his room. It was a close call. I didn't have anything on. He was just in his underclothes. I couldn't help it. I started to cry. He saw it. Told me to gather my wits. Said that he wanted a woman to want to be in his bed. So he had me leave. That was when they told him the truth of the rebellion. They knew even back then. He let me go the next day. He was drunk. That was when he attacked me. I got away," I said, trying to leave out the gruesome details.

"Yet you trust him?" Katniss asked disbelievingly.

"Somehow I do. I know that it doesn't make sense. I know that I shouldn't trust him. But for some reason I do. Because I know that he tried to get me to understand about the Games. He's the one person that has guaranteed that he would try and help get Cato back," I explained weakly.

"Do you ever think about what he did to you in the Games?" Katniss asked.

"All the time. That's why I don't completely trust them here," I said. Katniss raised her brow in confusion. "None of them helped."

"Gale says that they needed time to get everything together."

"I don't care. They could have done something."

"I agree."

"You're one of the few people who agree with me."

"Have you kissed him since?" Katniss asked.

"What?" I stuttered.

"Gale," she clarified. "Have you kissed him since?"

"Yes. Twice," I admitted.

"When?"

"The first time was that day when I went out into the woods with Gale. That day that we finally got to be with each other and be ourselves. I was about to suggest that I start taking over the snare run when he kissed me. It surprised me so much that I still didn't react in time. When he let go he told me that it was so I didn't think that the first one was on impulse."

Katniss snorted under her breath and I raised an eyebrow. "Never see those moments coming, do you?" she asked.

That was exactly what I had thought when he had kissed me right after the Games. And it wasn't just Gale. I hadn't seen them coming the first few times with Cato either. "Never. Not the kiss before I left for the Capitol. Not the kiss at Snow's party or the one before the Interviews. Not the one that Gale gave me that day. And not the last one either," I said.

"When was that?"

"After he was whipped. I went to kiss him on the cheek when he kissed me. I couldn't pull away or say anything to him. Not when he was like that."

We both sat in silence for a little while as Katniss nodded. I wasn't sure what she was going to think about the kiss. In the back of my mind I had always known that she had a little bit of a crush on Gale. I had even told Gale that in my final letter to him. I just didn't want her being upset with me that someone she had always loved was now interested in someone else. That would have made me feel awful. I didn't want to hurt her any more than I already had.

"So who's the better kisser?" Katniss asked suddenly.

"Cat!" I barked, startling her. Not just her, a number of the people standing around whipped back to see what was happening. "I don't think I've ever heard you say something like that."

"Sorry. It's been a long time since I've had a chance to say something like that," Katniss said.

"We used to always joke around like that. What happened?" I asked sadly.

"You won the Hunger Games," Katniss said.

"Survived," I corrected.

The two of us stood in silence for a few moments. "So who's better?" Katniss finally asked, nudging me gently.

Snorting under my breath, I shook my head. It would have made me feel bad, no matter who I said. "They're both so different. Gale's have always surprised me. I've never had the chance to really think about them. But they've been comforting. Because I'm used to having him around. Cato... There's something different in those. I'm in love with him, Cat. I really am. Kissing him is like being at home," I said sweetly.

Katniss smiled. "You two are sweet together."

"Thanks."

"When you were dancing on your wedding night, with Finnick, I think it was, I saw him watching you. There was this smile on his face. One that I had never seen before," Katniss said. I smiled softly. I wished that I could have seen that gaze. "It reminded me of the way that..."

"Your father used to look at your mother," I said, filling in the blanks.

"Yours, too," Katniss said, once more reminding me that her parents were mine, too. No matter who my birth parents were. "Yes."

"That's one of the things that I really miss," I said after a few beats of silence. Katniss turned to me confusedly. "Just having him around. Holding my hand. Comforting me after a nightmare. The kisses. The laughter. Just knowing that he's close."

"He would comfort you after the nightmares?" Katniss asked curiously.

"Yeah. He was one of the few people that used to be able to calm me down. Reassure me that it was just a nightmare. He would just let me cry or complain or say nothing and just ignore him," I explained.

Katniss smiled, placing a hand on my shoulder. She knew just how much Cato meant to me. "That's sweet. I guess he would understand. I would try to comfort you but I never knew how," Katniss admitted.

"He understood but I never knew when he was having a nightmare."

"He didn't thrash or scream?"

"No," I said. Somehow I was annoyed that I never knew when Cato had his nightmares. It made me feel like he had always known me so much better than I knew him. Which might have been true. "He said that he would just come to, paralyzed with fear. But apparently his nightmares were usually about losing me. When he saw that I was with him, he would calm down and go back to sleep."

Katniss smiled again. "That's really sweet. He must hate this," Katniss said. I raised a brow, unsure of what she meant. "Not knowing if you're okay."

"Just the way that I've been hating it. But he's alive and he'll be back here soon enough," I said hopefully.

"I didn't realize that the two of you would sleep in the same bed," Katniss said slowly.

That's right. I never told her that we had slept together. "Yeah. We slept together during the Games and it was impossible to stop once we were back in the Capitol. That first night back, when the two of us were alone, I grabbed him and asked him to stay with me. We just never changed after that," I said, knowing that she would understand.

And she did. "It's sweet. Someone to protect you."

"We protect each other. Just the way that I do with you."

"That's true."

"I would always fall asleep on his chest. His arm around my waist and the other lingering on my hip. I did it so that I could press my head against his chest. Listen to his heartbeat as I fell asleep."

"Reminding you that he was alive," Katniss said, filling in the blanks.

"Exactly," I confirmed.

"Must have been hard to come back home and not have him sleeping next to you."

That first night when I had been back home hadn't been too bad. We hadn't even slept in the bedrooms. Ms. Everdeen was on the plush chair as Katniss, Prim, and I all slept on the couch. Prim was sleeping in my lap and I was in Katniss's. There had been one nightmare but it hadn't been that bad. It was the next night - when I had finally slept in my own bedroom - that I had woken up in the middle of the night, thrashing and screaming in horror, sending the three women sprinting into my room in a panic.

"It was. I would wake up, panicked because he wasn't next to me," I said, remembering all sorts of horrible nightmares that I had faced over the last year.

"I'm sorry, Aspen. We're going to get him back as soon as we can," Katniss promised.

"I know."

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure."

Even if I had said no, she would have asked the question anyways. "That night of the wedding... Back when you were in the Capitol before the Quell. I heard all of the passing comments when we were saying goodbye," Katniss said.

My head started to spin, but this time it wasn't from the concussion. "Are you trying to ask me if I've slept with Cato?" I asked dumbly.

"Uh, yeah. I am," Katniss said awkwardly.

The two of us stared at each other for a few seconds. All of a sudden we both burst into a hysterical fit of laughter. I leaned forward and fell into Katniss's arms, the two of us still unable to stop laughing. For a long damn time. It was the first time in months that the two of us had laughed and gossiped together. We hardly ever did anything like that. I could barely remember the last time that we did. We had been allies in this for so long that we had forgotten what it was like to be sisters and best friends.

When we finally managed to calm down, I still couldn't quite breathe properly. "Come on. Tell me," Katniss prodded, poking me in the stomach.

"Yeah. I have," I muttered, turning bright red.

Katniss's face turned up into a maniacal smile. "That's everything? Tell me more!" she goaded. I snorted again. It was like we were kids again, discussing the gross boys in our classes. "Come on. Was it after the Games?"

"No!" I shouted, affronted. It hadn't been that soon. "No. I couldn't do it yet. Despite all of the teasing that went back and forth between the two of us, we never did more than some kissing and misplaced clothes. The entire time. Even on the Victory Tour. We would sleep together but that was for comfort. Because the Victory Tour was so hard. We just tried to get through it together. From time to time I would know that I wanted it but I never said anything. It was the night that we were in the Capitol. That was when it happened."

Katniss's brows knitted together in confusion. "I thought that was the night that Seneca Crane..." she trailed off, unwilling to repeat what had happened.

"Yes. That was it. It was that day. He brought me to his apartment and that was when everything happened. When I got back to the penthouse I cleaned up and saw that Cato was still there. He had been waiting for me the entire time. I realized that I had been given another day and I wanted it. It was something that I wanted that I could actually have. So I asked him to do it. For a minute he offered to wait," I said.

"Really?" Katniss asked, surprised.

"Yeah. He told me that we didn't have to just because we were getting married." She smiled, clearly glad that he could be a gentleman when he wanted to. "But I wanted it. Before Seneca could take it what I thought would be the next night," I explained.

"So you did it so that it would be Cato's, at least, and not Seneca's."

"No! That wasn't the whole reason. It was more than that. I really did want it. I had wanted it the entire time that we were on the Victory Tour. It was just something that I wanted. It was one of the few things that I got."

"So it was that night?"

"Yeah. Right after what happened with Seneca."

"Well... How was it?" Katniss asked awkwardly.

"Do you honestly want to know?" I asked.

"I'm curious," Katniss admitted.

"It's not like you would think that it is. I mean it's romantic, but it's not in a traditional sense. There's definitely something about it that's not very romantic. More... intimate, I guess. There's something about being with someone, without anything separating you, which makes you completely vulnerable. You're totally at this other person's mercy. But if you trust them, that's what makes it good. I mean, it's a little painful at first. I bled a little bit when we first did it. But after a little while I started feeling better.

"It's weird though. I kind of laid there for a while. Didn't really do anything. Actually I didn't do anything at all. I just kind of let him take the lead, since he had done it before. I was so embarrassed afterwards. I just buried my head in Cato's shoulder and whined. He was laughing. Not at me. At the fact that I was embarrassed. But he told me that I hadn't done anything wrong. He was saying that it was perfect. The only thing that mattered was that we were together.

"Which was really sweet. But at first I was really embarrassed because I had never been with anyone and I knew that he had. He told me that it was kind of like the first time that he had been with anyone. Because he had never attached feelings to the act. Not before me. It just took some time for things to change between us. For me to kind of react a little bit better to being with him. You know, it was weird, but with time it kind of became fun," I explained as best I could.

"So it's fun?" Katniss asked.

"Yeah. In some ways, it is. But I wouldn't recommend doing it with anyone you don't know," I said.

"I wasn't even planning on doing it with anyone that I did know."

"Not even someone like Gale?" I asked teasingly.

"Aspen!" Katniss shouted, horrified.

Her face was bright red. "Come on, you like him. Everyone knows that you like him. You might not know it, but I do. Just give him a chance," I begged.

"It's the wrong time to be thinking about boys," Katniss said.

"It's never the right time," I pointed out.

"He's hung up on you," Katniss said.

To my surprise, she didn't sound bitter. But Katniss had always been that way. She didn't care for guys. And there was still a part of her that was hung up on Peeta. "He won't always be," I said, referring back to Gale.

"Stop. What about... kids?" Katniss asked slowly.

For a moment I hesitated, unsure of what she was talking about. But then I realized what she meant. "Honestly I didn't think about it at the time. Which was stupid, I know," I said quickly, when I saw the look that she was giving me. "But Cato promised me that he knew what he was doing and it's been over seven months. I think I'm okay."

"Was that the only time?" Katniss asked.

"Of course not," I snorted, earning a snort from Katniss. "It happened a number of times leading up to the Quell."

"But the pregnancy ruse was just that, right?" Katniss asked.

"Of course. I didn't want to have a kid and Cato knew that. Not for a long time. If ever."

"You would make a good mother."

"Thanks. So would you."

"I can't believe that you didn't tell me," Katniss said, scowling.

Rolling my eyes at her, I threw an arm over her shoulder and pulled her into me. "Well in the future I will tell you every single time that it happens. And I will tell you in excruciating detail about every moment of the entire ordeal," I said playfully.

"Oh I can pass on that. I can't believe that the two of you slept together and you didn't tell me!" Katniss barked, pulling out of my hold and whopping me on the arm.

"Honestly I figured that you would have known," I said.

"Well I definitely didn't figure it out."

"You're kind of stupid for not figuring it out."

We stared at each other again before cracking up. It was the way that we used to be. I missed being like this with her. Katniss shoved me off to the side and I giggled again. Katniss opened her arms and I walked right into her, giving her a tight hug. It was the first time that either one of us showed any affection for the other that didn't feel like it was required to keep our friendship from unraveling. This was the one thing that felt helpful and real. Detached from the rebellion.

"Come on. Let's go back," I said, pulling out of the hug.

"Alright."

Together the two of us walked back to the compartment, her arms draped over my shoulder. Some people were staring at us, clearly confused at our affection. But we didn't stop to speak with anyone. Exhausted from hunting and my lack of sleep from the night before, we quickly went back to our compartment to find it stripped bare. I stopped in the doorway and stared blankly, only to remember that we had been moved because of Buttercup. So we made our way up to the top floor to find Compartment E.

"Almost forgot about the new compartment," I said dumbly.

"Me, too."

"By the way, don't you dare tell Gale," I snapped as we walked.

"Of course not," Katniss said, affronted. "Does anyone else know?"

"Mom knows."

"How does she know?"

"That was what was in her letter."

"And you didn't tell me?" Katniss barked.

"Sorry, Cat," I said, wrapping her back in another hug. Thinking back on it, I probably should have told her. It would have been someone to talk things out with. "But at least I told you now. And I told you more about it than I've told anyone else."

"Oh, I'm honored," Katniss snapped.

The next chance that I got to sleep with Cato, I was going to sleep with him and tell her everything. We arrived at our new home and I glanced inside. It looked exactly like Compartment 307, except for the window - two feet wide, eight inches high - centered at the top of the outside wall. There was a heavy metal plate that fastened over it, but right now it was propped open, and a certain cat was nowhere to be seen. I stretched out on my bed, and a shaft of afternoon sunlight played on my face.

But just a moment later I sat back upright. "You sleep for a while. I'm gonna go out with Dean. And there's something that I need to tell Seneca," I said, remembering the treatment of the Prep Team.

"Okay. See you later?" Katniss asked, sitting upright.

"I'll be back before Reflection and the assembly," I said.

"Careful out there."

"Always."

As Katniss dropped back onto the bed, she closed her eyes and her breathing almost immediately evened out. She had looked tired during our hunt. She wasn't used to hunting anymore. It had been far too long. I slipped out of the compartment quietly to head into the upper levels of District 13. I needed to go speak with Seneca before I did anything else with Dean. There was something important that I had to say and he had to know if we were really going to be allies.

On my way to find Seneca - who I assumed would be near Plutarch or the War Room - I passed numerous members of District 13. Many of them were murmuring about me. Some were questioning where I was supposed to be. I ignored them. Some seemed to be happy that I had agreed to be the Mockingjay. That rumor was already spreading. But they wouldn't be happy with me once Coin made her announcement. I rounded another corner and luckily spotted Seneca speaking with some other Capitol rebels.

"Seneca. May I have a word?" I asked, walking up and interrupting their conversation.

"Of course. Pardon me," Seneca said, dismissing himself from his friends and heading off into the corner of the room with me. "What can I help you with?"

"Did you know?" I asked sharply.

"About?" Seneca asked.

"My Prep Team!"

"Ah... I was made aware that they were rescued but I haven't seen them since arriving here. Have you found them?"

"Yes. Chained to a wall, beaten, starved, and humiliated," I sneered. Seneca gave a very surprised look. Maybe he hadn't been told either. "All because they took a piece of bread because they aren't used to eating like this."

"Well none of us are used to eating like this," Seneca said. "Are you sure that -?"

"That they were being treated like animals?" I interrupted irritably. "Yes. I'm sure. They can be horrible people at times. I know that. But I won't stand to have someone treated the way that I was. Especially not people like that. Barely as intelligent as children."

"I wasn't aware that they were being treated as such. Have they been removed?"

"Yes. They're healing in the hospital ward. Tomorrow I think that I'm going to start undergoing the process to become their Mockingjay."

"I think that they'll be okay. They just need an adjustment period."

"They'll never be used to this place."

"I don't think that you will be either," Seneca pointed out.

"No. Probably not. I just - I can't believe that they did that to them!" I shouted, annoyed with myself for caring so much about them and with Thirteen for treating them the way that they did. "To the foolish little Prep Team! It was Coin's warning to me."

"That's probably true. She believes that we're taking too big of a risk with you," Seneca said.

"And you?" I asked.

"I believe that you're the only person who can do this. I believe that my faith in you is not misplaced."

"Thank you."

"This means that you'll now have to do everything that they tell you to do."

It would just be another moment that I would be forced to be someone's doll. At least this time I was doing something important. "Apparently. That was the deal. I would do whatever they needed me to do and they would keep the Victors safe. As long as I do what they want, they'll do what I want. Do you think that they'll stick to their word?" I asked carefully.

"Yes. Especially if made in front of a large audience. They can't just go back on their words," Seneca said.

"That's what I'm hoping for," I muttered.

Seneca placed his arm on my shoulder but retracted it almost immediately. "I'll take care of your Prep Team," he promised. I nodded my thanks. "I'm very sorry for what's happened to them. But I must say that I'm surprised that you're defending them."

He sounded just like Gale. Shocked that I was going to help them. "I don't care who they are. I know that they cared for me. And to watch something like that happen to them..." I said, cringing when I thought of their treatment. They really weren't that different here than they were in the Capitol. "They're not used to the horrors of life that I am. That we are."

"Not even with the Games?" Seneca asked.

"To them that's just entertainment. I try to remember that - if I had been raised in the Capitol - I would have been just like them," I said, hating the thought that I could be anything like them.

"Instead you became a symbol of the rebellion," Seneca said.

"Not something that I particularly wanted, but something that I know that I have to accept," I said.

It would never have been anything that I would have wanted. There were a number of things that I wanted. To keep Prim and Katniss safe from the Games. I had managed that much. I wanted my parents back. But that wasn't something that I could get. I had always wanted the Games to be gone. That was the one thing that I was managing. But I had never wanted to be the reason that they were gone. I wanted someone else to deal with it. But life never worked out the way that we wanted.

"Your parents would be proud of the young woman that you are becoming," Seneca said.

"I like to believe that. You - You never met them, did you?" I asked.

Seneca shook his head somewhat regretfully. But I was glad that he hadn't known them. "No. But I do remember their Games. I was fourteen when your father competed in his Games. I was sixteen when your mother competed," Seneca explained.

"So you remember their Games?" I asked slowly.

"Very well."

"Did you know me when I volunteered?" I asked curiously.

Seneca stared at me for a moment before shaking his head. "No. But I knew your name the moment that you said it. I remember being shocked when you said your name. I had long since forgotten about them," Seneca admitted.

"I'm glad to make people remember. I don't like the thought of them just being faceless Tributes," I said.

"They weren't," Seneca promised.

The two of us stared at each other for a moment. I didn't like conversations about my parents. They made me antsy. "I'm going to go back out hunting. Dean is in his training period right now and he asked me if I would take him," I said, trying to change the subject.

"Aren't you finished with your hour?" Seneca asked curiously.

"Yes. But, honestly, what are they going to do? Kill me?" I asked. Seneca snorted. For just a moment, I saw a real man. Not the Gamemaker I had once hated so much. "I'd like to see how that would go over."

"You're far too daring," Seneca said.

"That's probably exactly the reason that we're standing here right now," I pointed out.

To be honest, we both knew that it was the exact reason that we had gotten to this point. All because I was a little too daring. I had been daring when I had volunteered, when I had made my first little speech, and gotten to know Cato. I had been daring in the way that I had attacked the Gamemakers, spoken to Snow and Seneca all of those times, and risked my life throughout the Games. Not to mention the trick with the knives. And, of course, my destruction of the force field.

All of this because I had done far too many things that were too daring. "Enjoy your trip," Seneca finally said, probably unwilling to remember everything I had done to almost get him killed.

"Absolutely." I was about to walk off when I remembered something. One of the reasons that I had come to speak to him in the first place. "Seneca?" I called.

"Yes?"

"Was there something that you wanted to tell me?" I asked. He looked unclear on what I meant. "Yesterday. You were in my room and you were going to say something. Gale interrupted us."

"Perhaps another time," Seneca said, turning to leave.

"Wait," I said, running after him and grabbing his arm, pulling him back. "Come on. Just tell me."

"Are we friends?" Seneca asked.

"Yes. I think that we can finally say that we are friends," I said slowly.

"Then I can't be the one to tell you this," Seneca said.

How was that fair? "That doesn't make any sense. If we're friends, tell me," I goaded.

He had to tell me what he meant. I deserved that much. I deserved for people to start telling me the truth. "It's for that exact reason that I can't tell you. But perhaps you should speak with Haymitch," Seneca said.

"Is he even still alive?" I growled.

As much as I wanted to hate Haymitch - and I genuinely did, in my own way - I didn't want to hear that he was dead. Because he had done a lot for me over the past year. He had even helped out my parents. And he had kept one of his promises. He had kept his promise to Cato. I was just furious that he hadn't kept his promise to me. I had known him longer. I was the one that he was supposed to keep his promises to. I would always be angry about that.

"Last I heard. They're trying to take care of him," Seneca said.

Obviously he would still be detoxing from all of the alcohol. "I have nothing to say to Haymitch," I said irritably.

"Trust me when I say that it would be helpful to speak with him," Seneca said.

Maybe one day I would be able to force myself to go and see him. "So it's my secret, but for some reason, I'm the person who doesn't know it," I commented.

"You would think that you would be used to it," Seneca said.

"You would think. But I have a feeling that it will never be like that."

"I'm deeply sorry that this continues to happen to you," Seneca said slowly.

Shrugging my shoulders, I turned in a circle around him. "Maybe one day I'll get used to it. But I'm not sure that I can go and speak to Haymitch. I haven't seen him since that day on the hovercraft. I really don't want to see him and I highly doubt that he wants to see me," I said honestly.

"But this is important. This is something that you should speak to him about," Seneca promised.

"Why can't you tell me?" I asked.

"Because this is something that I wasn't supposed to be made privy to. They thought that I would tell you," Seneca explained.

"Their faith was misplaced," I said grumpily.

"Go find Haymitch and speak to him about it," Seneca said.

"Funny how it all works out," I said, realizing something. Seneca raised a perfectly-formed brow. "One of the people who I trusted least in the entire world has now become one of my most trusted confidantes. And one of the only people who I genuinely trusted in the world has now become someone that I wish that I had never trusted."

Seneca smiled guiltily and shook his head. "Haymitch wanted to get Cato out, too. Believe it or not, he cares for the boy. So does Brutus. Coin wanted Cato to come out of the arena." I snorted. That much I had already known. "But we picked you in the end. We knew that you wouldn't be happy with us," Seneca said.

"You were right," I said.

"But we were hoping that you would be able to move past it for the greater good."

"I'm barely twenty. There should be no greater good for me," I said sadly.

"I know. But that's the way that life works sometimes."

"Lucky me."

The two of us stood in silence for a few moments as I shifted awkwardly. Maybe I did need to speak with Haymitch. Maybe he could help. "You mentioned that you were going hunting?" Seneca asked suddenly.

"Yes. I should get going," I said, pointing away.

"Weren't you already out this morning?" Seneca asked.

"Yes. But I went out with Katniss and Gale. I want to go out with Dean for a little while," I said.

"Your hour isn't up?" Seneca asked.

There came the point of me always being terrible at following the rules. "Oh, it is. But I have a Weapons Management class after this and I really am not in the mood for sitting through classes. Dean has training. So I figured that I would go out again. I kind of have some good leverage for getting them to let me out again," I said pointedly.

"That's true. Have a good trip," Seneca said.

"Thanks." We were about to leave again when I thought about something. "You interested in ever learning?" I asked, obviously surprising him.

"As funny as it might sound, I've never picked up a weapon before," Seneca said.

"What better time to learn than during a war?" I teased.

Seneca gave me a grateful smile. "Perhaps. I'll see you during the assembly," Seneca said.

"See you later," I chirped.

Maybe it would be a good chance for the two of us to genuinely bond. We hadn't gotten that chance yet. I wanted to trust Seneca so badly, but I needed to know if I could. What better way to learn to trust someone than to take the time bonding with them? As I walked off, I realized that I had absolutely no idea where Dean would be right now. I just knew that he had training next, but it wasn't quite time for him to be there yet. So I meandered down a few hallways, all the while being unable to find him.

Eventually I made my way back down the hallway where I used to live and headed into the Hadley compartment. Most of them weren't there, not that I could be surprised. It was the middle of the day. Alana and Damien were at work. Skye and Julie were in their classes, probably with Gale. Aidan was in school like Prim. Only Marley and Carrie were in the compartment. Carrie was taking care of her. As I exchanged a few comments with her, Carrie let me know to check for Dean in the cafeteria.

She also made me promise not to take it easy on Dean when we were out there. I promised her that I wouldn't. I thanked her and promised that I really would watch out for him while we were out hunting. Not that we needed to. There was nothing that dangerous in these woods. I headed back out into the dining room and spotted Dean sitting at the Hadley's table by himself. I walked over and plopped down into the empty chair next to him.

"Dean," I greeted.

"Aspen. Hey. How are you?" Dean asked.

"I've finally gotten the chance to breathe some air for the first time since being here," I answered.

The corners of his lips turned upwards. It didn't take a genius to figure out what I meant. "You went hunting this morning, didn't you?" Dean asked, grinning.

"Yes. With Katniss and Gale. We had a good haul. More fresh meat than I'd be willing to bet that District 13 has seen in a long time," I said carelessly.

Dean gave a happy smile. "I'll be looking forward to that at dinner," he said.

Dinner was never a good meal in District 13. In fact, none of our meals were very good. Water and milk right now were the only things that we were allowed to drink. Usually dinner was some type of soup with whatever chopped up vegetables that they could find, which were almost always disgusting. Pea soup was also very popular, but it was unfortunately something that I despised. Potatoes, onions, and turnips all made regular appearances, but none of them tasted like the delicacies in the Capitol.

It was the one thing that I missed about the place. The good food. We could definitely use some fresh meat in District 13. "So what are you doing right now?" I asked, shattering the silence.

"Eating," Dean said carelessly.

We both laughed. "How about hunting?" I offered.

"You've already used your hour though, haven't you?" Dean asked.

"Sure. But you haven't. You're going to training," I pointed out.

"What about the time limit that you have?" Dean asked.

"There aren't too many good things about being the Mockingjay. It's kind of a pain in the ass. But I did find something worth it. I can pretty much say and do whatever I want and they have to bend to my will. Since this isn't anything too big I figure that they'll have to bend. Plus I thought that we could spend some time together," I said brightly.

Dean and Carrie had always been my favorite of the Hadley's anyways. It would be nice for us to spend some time together doing what I loved best. "I would love that. I'm finished here. Shall we?" Dean offered.

"Absolutely," I said, hopping to my feet.

"You know, I don't have a weapon," Dean pointed out.

"Gale said that he would let you borrow his bow. Just don't break it. I can't promise what he'll do to you if you break his precious bow," I said, handing over Gale's bow.

It wasn't nearly as nice as mine, but it wasn't totally useless. Dean took the bow and slowly ran a hand over the wooden limbs. It was old. One of the oldest bows that I knew of. His father had made it long before Gale was even born. At least Katniss and I's bows had been made after we were born. Mr. Everdeen had made ours. The one that I was currently using was mine from the Games. I hated what it reminded me of, but there was no doubt that it was the best of the three weapons.

"Oh, I understand about a man and his weapons. I used to use a broadsword and I would have killed someone if they damaged it," Dean said, staring down at the bow.

"That's what Cato used in the Games," I commented, unsure of why I had said it.

Of course Dean would have known what weapon his brother had used. He had watched him train with it growing up. "Yes. I got it from my father, Cato got it from me, and Aidan got it from Cato. Sword fighting runs with the men in the family. The women tend to like knives." To his credit, I was definitely fond of knives, too. I had just recently developed better aim with the bow. "We've never had an archer in the family before," Dean commented.

"First time for everything, I suppose," I said, turning my bow over in my hands.

"It's cool. I always liked watching archery," Dean said.

"Not big in District 2?" I asked.

Being easier to make shots with a bow, I would have thought that it was a popular weapon. "Not at all. You know, they would prefer the close-up action of a knife or sword fight," Dean explained.

"Yeah. I knew during my first private training session that I had to show off with the bow and arrows or else there was a good chance that they wouldn't put one in there," I said, remembering the advice that Gale had given me.

"You did well. To be honest, we were kind of glad that Glimmer cut you off for the bow. We knew that you would have been able to take out the Careers when you were stuck up in that tree with it," Dean said.

For a moment I hesitated. I had almost forgotten about that. He was right. The first few times that the Careers had cornered me - both knowing and unknowingly - I hadn't had the bow. I had been griping to myself about how easy it would have been to take them all out if I had the bow and arrows. I had known how easy it would have been. The problem with knives was that they had been too hard to make the strange angles with. But now... maybe it was a good thing that I hadn't had it.

The one thing that Glimmer had done right. She had cut me off for that damned bow. Little did she know that by cutting me off and keeping me from killing Cato, she had helped set all of this in motion. At least, that was what I told myself to keep me from thinking that all of this was my fault. I knew that it wasn't all my fault. There were so many other people who had helped this along. Some who knew exactly what they were doing and others who had no idea what they were doing.

"In retrospect, I guess I'm glad that I didn't have it, too," I said slowly.

"Shall we?" Dean asked.

"Sure. Let's get everything together," I said.

Together the two of us headed back up towards the top of District 13 and out into the opening, not far from the entry of the training grounds. It took some convincing for the guards to let me come out, but after some complaining for a few minutes and threats about taking back my promise about being the Mockingjay, they finally allowed to let me out. Not that they looked very happy about it. But Plutarch and Seneca agreed to just let me out and save the fight.

It was smart of them. Because they knew that I would fight tooth and nail to get them to let me go out there for another hour and cause a number of problems in the process. We sat together for a long while as the guards explained the rules to me again and Dean for the first time and we were refitted with the tracking devices. It was as annoying as it was the first time. As we made to leave, I promised to watch out for Dean, taking back my pack of arrows and handing him a new pack.

As we headed out of the training field, I pulled my bow off of my back and held it out. "Mine is a little easier to use. Do you want to give it a try?" I asked.

"No. Being from District 2, I like the challenge," Dean said.

We both smiled. I could appreciated that. "Okay. Shall we?" I asked.

"We shall."

For the second time that day, I walked out of the electrified fence and headed off into the woods. For a while I let Dean take the lead to go wherever he wanted. I figured that he could figure it out. But I saw that he did trace over his tracks a few times. He clearly wasn't a hunter as he couldn't tell where he was going and didn't know how to stay on a straight path. So I took over the lead and motioned for him to follow me. His footfalls were loud but the animals weren't suspicious enough to care.

It was obvious that we weren't going to scare them off. There had never been hunters out in these woods before. They didn't understand the danger of our little bits of noise. It was a refreshing change from the more difficult to hunt in woods of District 12. Which was likely now destroyed after the firebombs were dropped. Large bits of the woods had been destroyed along with half of the Meadow. I had spread Leah's ashes in the bits of the Meadow that weren't destroyed.

As the minutes ticked by and we went further and further out into the woods, I found myself getting a little more relaxed. I loved being out here. It almost made me forget about the rebellion, the Capitol, Cato, and the Mockingjay. Being out here reminded me of the days before the first Reaping that had sent me into the Games. It reminded me of the days before I knew what it was like to be painfully in love and before my friendship with Katniss and Gale had become so strained.

Trying to focus my mind on what was happening all around me and focusing just on the surrounding woods, I tried to go back to the way that I used to be. A hunter. And a damned good one. So I focused on the details. Dean had Gale's bow slung over his back as we walked. He didn't know how to use it - nocking the arrow, anchoring it, aiming, or firing. I was planning on waiting until we were a little deeper into the woods before showing him how.

On my order, Dean was silent as we walked through the woods. I had explained to him early on in our trek that even though the soft noises of our footfalls or breathing wouldn't alert them, the sound of our voices would. They would deem it as a predator coming to attack. And I was planning on trying to show him how to actually hunt an animal. My ears were tuned in for anything that I could hear. A change in the wood or crack of the branch.

Unlike Dean, I had my bow in my hand and an arrow already nocked. Just in case I heard or saw something. There was also always the chance that there could have been something dangerous in the woods. I had seen my fair share of wolves for one lifetime. As I stepped over a fallen tree, I heard Dean step on a twig. We both froze. The moment that the crack echoed through the wood, a bird flew out of the tree behind us.

It looked like it might have been something like a groosling. The thought only painfully reminded me of one of the people who I was doing all of this for. Rue. I acted faster than I had on that awful day. I heard the leaves fluttering as the bird shot off and I turned back on my heel, aiming over Dean's head. He ducked down, clearly realizing what I was planning on doing, and I fired. The bird fell out of the air a moment later and landed on the ground with a soft thump.

The bird landed about fifty feet away from us. The arrow was straight through the eye, wasting none of the meat. Just the way that Mr. Everdeen had once taught us. I noticed that Dean's jaw was practically hanging open. I smiled at him and walked over to the bird. I yanked the arrow out of the eye socket, cleaned it off with a piece of moss, slipped the arrow back into the sheath, and stuffed the bird into the game back. I hooked the game bag back around my waist and walked back to Dean.

"How did you do that? You didn't even see it," Dean said breathlessly.

"I heard it," I answered.

Dean laughed under his breath. It showed the difference between the two of us; a Career and a hunter. Careers were taught to use their eyes. When they saw something, they took the chance to attack. They saw the big picture. But I was a hunter. I relied on the little things. Those tiny sounds more than anything else. The ability to spot something - some minuscule detail - that tipped me off to the fact that something was wrong. I supposed that it made Cato and I a good team. We saw the details and big picture.

"I remember you mentioning that from the first Games that you were in. You told Cato that was the problem with being deaf in one ear. You relied more on your ears than your eyes," Dean said.

Having that brief deafness - which was technically permanent - was horrible. "That's what hunting is about. You listen," I said.

"Alright. Teach me, master," Dean teased.

We both laughed as I shoved him away from me. "You stand still. That's the first thing about hunting. Moving around makes things worse. The animals can hear you. Feel the changes," I said. Dean nodded, remaining otherwise still. "We learn to become just like them. Hunters become the animals."

"Spoken like a true hunter," Dean said, smiling.

"Take your shoes off." Dean looked at me like I had lost my mind. "You walk too loudly right now." Dean nodded and slipped his boots off, tossing them into the game bag. "What we're doing right now it called still-hunting. You decide on a period of time to stand still; five minutes or so. You'll be forced to remain quiet and silent for a minimum amount of time, longer if necessary," I said, keeping him on my left side.

"Did you do this in Twelve?" Dean asked quietly.

The days that we had been forced to stand still for hours on end... "Yes. During the winter a lot. Everything was dead and crunched loudly. So we stood still and waited," I explained.

"You just learned all this?" Dean asked.

"With time. Katniss's father taught me. My parents left behind a book with some tricks," I said. I wished that I still had the book, but it had been lost in the rubble of the Everdeen's old home after the firebombing. "We learned things ourselves. We put it all together and became a perfect team."

"You three trust each other beyond anything I've ever seen before," Dean said, referring to Katniss, Gale, and I.

"We're family. We grew up together and protected each other. That's just how it goes," I muttered.

"You make a good team," Dean said.

"Thanks," I said softly.

Once upon a time we had been the best team that anyone could have imagined. And, in some ways, we still were. We knew exactly how to hunt together. We didn't need words. We just knew. We knew exactly how to work together. And we still had our moments of being best friends. But there were so many things that happened. The tenseness with Gale because of my marriage to Cato. My anger with Katniss for not telling me the truth. The fact that we were all hot-headed and tended to yell at each other...

"There's a different trick you use for deer," I said, desperate to change the subject.

"What's that?" Dean asked.

"Deer are easily alerted to human cadence," I said.

"What?" Dean asked dumbly.

"The noise that we make while we walk," I explained. Dean nodded in understanding. "The slow hunter's tread. You have to try taking quick steps in a short sprint for ten to twenty yards or so. Stop, and do it again. Keep your footfalls as light as possible; you would be surprised at how much you sound like a squirrel scrambling through the leaves."

"Clever," Dean said.

"Thank you. That was a trick that my parents left behind. I've only taken down three deer before and one barely counted," I said, remembering the poor baby that we had more put out of its misery than anything else. "Okay. Now for tracking. Remember when I blew up the Career supplies in my first Games?"

Dean snorted under his breath. "That's a hard one to forget," Dean said.

He wasn't bitter about it. They hadn't been bitter about it in a long time. "Pulling that hood up, I had a reason. Keep from leaving a blood trail," I explained. Dean nodded. "We're doing just that here. You find a blood trail and follow it. It'll likely lead you to an injured animal."

"Okay."

"We've lost many animals to this one. The instant drop. An animal that drops immediately is more likely to run off than one that doesn't go down but runs some distance and then falls. The animal that falls immediately might do so from shock, then recover and run. When an animal drops instantly, stay put and be prepared for a quick follow-up shot."

"That must have burned."

It was a mistake that I had made a number of times when I had first started hunting. "Oh, it did. I shot a deer once and it did just that. I tracked it all damn day. Lost it and had nothing. It was a very hungry weekend," I said bitterly.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Dean said.

"That's okay. Keep your eyes up. Animals will leave blood trails on leaves and trees, too. Not just the ground. When you shoot an animal, be aware if they're just playing dead. If you need to make another shot, go for the throat or eyes. No wasting meat with body shots," I said.

"You sound almost like one of the instructors in District 2," Dean commented.

"I'm not sure whether to thank you or slap you," I said seriously.

"A thanks would be appreciated," Dean said.

We both laughed. In the back of my mind I was sure that he held some fondness for the instructors back in District 2. They had probably felt like a part of the family for a long time. I wondered how they felt about everything right now. I reached down into my boot and pulled out what I had slipped in it before. Dean was watching me with curious eyes as I held out the piece of leather to him. He didn't take it, clearly not understanding what it was.

"Okay. This is an arm guard. It goes on the forearm of the arm that's holding the bow. Its purpose is to protect your arm if the string hits it. Trust me, it hurts," I promised.

"Okay."

All I could remember was the time that I was finally getting used to really firing my bow back when I was thirteen or so. I had been about to release my arrow to hit a knot in a tree about ten feet away when a crack of a branch had startled me and I let the string slip. It had burned straight across my forearm, leaving a nasty rash for days. I slowly laced it up Dean's arm and made sure to hook it around his fingers, tightening it to make sure that the string wouldn't catch on the eyelets.

"Just like that. Comfortable?" I asked, straightening it out.

"Yes."

"We'll practice with that tree," I said, pointing to a tree that was about fifteen feet away. "See that knot at about your throat height?"

"Yes."

"You're gonna aim for that."

"Okay."

"Stand perpendicular to the target," I ordered. Dean moved into position. I placed my hands on my stomach and rotated his body so that he was standing completely in line. "You're right-handed?"

"Yes."

"Stand with your left hip pointing toward the target. Keep the rest of your body vertical. Don't lean to one side or the other," I said, correcting a few bits of his stance. "Turn only your head towards the target." I forced his shoulders back into line. "Chest in and shoulders down, make sure not to hunch up your shoulders."

"Like that?" Dean asked, straightening out a little bit.

"Good. Now for the bow. Hold the bow with your left hand on the hand grip. Your life line should be perpendicular to the ground when you hold your bow. Your knuckles should be at an approximately forty-five degree angle." Dean placed his hands where I showed him. "Don't hold the bow with a death grip. It'll make the shot inaccurate. Be relaxed so that every movement will be smooth," I said, watching as his hand turned white.

"Okay. Like this?" he asked.

His grip slowly let up on the bow. "Yes. You need to load the arrow by fitting the notch in the end of the arrow onto the bow string. Do it before lifting your bow and without actually drawing the string." He did as told. "Lift the bow to shoulder height. The arm holding the bow needs to be straight and locked at the elbow. Put the odd color vane between the riser and the arm holding the bow," I continued to explain, manipulating his arms into the right stance.

"Good?" Dean asked.

"Good. Pull the bowstring back. Pull back far enough that your hand rests right under your jawbone. Touch your face around the corner of your mouth. That's your anchor point," I said, pushing his arm forward a bit. "Don't twist your torso to face the target. Don't be afraid of the string and touch it to your face. It won't hurt you."

I pushed his hand up against his face to make sure that the string was touching his mouth. "Okay," Dean said.

"Let the stronger muscles in your back do most of the work as you draw the bow as opposed to your arm muscles. And don't chicken wing by placing your elbow below the arrow. Keep it up and aligned with the arrow. Like this," I said, pushing his arm straight.

"Got it," Dean said.

"Take aim. You want to aim with your dominant eye while keeping your other eye closed. Your dominant eye is much more reliable for your aim to the target. I think it's your right one," I said after a beat.

"How can you tell?" Dean asked, surprised.

"Just by the way you look at things," I answered vaguely. Really it was because Cato's dominant eye was his right and that was usually genetic. "Relax your fingers off the string to loose. Don't jerk the string back, or the arrow won't fly straight. Keep your release as smooth and gentle as possible. When you've released, stay still until you hear the arrow hit the target."

"Okay," Dean said.

"Shoulder up. Press against your mouth. Slowly release," I instructed.

His movements were very slow and very deliberate. Which was a good thing, because I had to step in four or five times to make minor adjustments. I didn't want him to completely miss his first shot. I knew how awful that was. When Mr. Everdeen had taught me, I had completely missed my second shot by feet. The only reason that I had made my first was because Mr. Everdeen had kept his arm around me and made the shot half by himself.

Standing back a few inches from Dean - leaving him just enough room to try and make the shot properly - I watched as he fingers very slowly relaxed from the string. Just the way that I had shown him. He had dropped the bow slightly, so it wouldn't be totally accurate, but it looked close. I watched as he ultimately let the string go and watched as it snapped forward and the arrow flew off. Dean stayed in position as I turned towards the tree and grinned. Dean slowly lowered the bow to look at his shot.

It was just a few inches underneath the knot. "Not bad," I admitted.

Dean turned to me with a grateful smile. "You're a good teacher," Dean praised.

"Thank you."

"Your turn," Dean teased.

Laughing under my breath, I nodded. I probably should have seen that one coming. But I knew how to make my shot perfectly. I slipped an arrow out of the sheath, nocked the arrow, raised the bow, aimed quickly, pulling back the string to my anchor point, and fired. The arrow shot straight off of the bow and went right where I wanted it. The arrow went straight through the arrow that Dean had just shot and split the metal arrow down the middle. Just as I had done my first time around in private training.

It reminded me just of how the Hunger Games really affected me at every moment of my life. "You're a better shot than Cato ever could be," Dean commented, staring bewilderingly at the shot.

"Thanks. Years of practice," I said, walking over to the tree.

Taking the split arrow, I tossed it off to the side - now that it was completely useless - and placed the other one back in my sheath. "You're fast, too," Dean added.

"You have to be fast to be a hunter. With time you'll get better," I reassured him.

"Alright. I want to try without your help," Dean said hopefully.

"Go ahead," I said excitedly.

It was always fun to see just how well someone could do without your help. I had faith that Dean could do pretty well, considering just how good he was back in the Academy. Not that I had ever seen him fight or train before. But Cato had told me numerous stories of his training and I knew that Dean had almost been the one to volunteer for the Games when he was eighteen. That meant that he had to be good. Plus he was large and powerful. It showed how well-trained he had once been.

Taking a few steps back, I started to spin an arrow in my hand as I watched Dean. He grabbed another one of his own arrows, nocked it properly, set it against the bow and pulled back the string. He moved with slow and deliberate movements. His setup was good, clearly the way that someone trained would work, but he wouldn't make a center shot. It was his positioning that was wrong. He was too tense and slightly off-centered. When he finally fired, it barely clipped the edge of the tree.

"Don't feel bad. It takes time," I said softly.

"When did you start getting better?" Dean asked.

"When I was about thirteen or so. But that was years after I first started using the bow. I fired one for the first time when I was six," I said, remembering the shot.

"You're very good," Dean said.

"Thanks," I chirped brightly. "I'm hoping that they'll let me use it when the time comes that I go out in the field."

The bow and arrow was my weapon. So were knives. They always would be. I couldn't get used to the idea of a gun. "I can't imagine that they wouldn't. You're clearly a good shot," Dean said.

"Thank you."

"I'd like to see you try and teach Cato one day."

Snorting under my breath, I shook my head. He would take a lot of time. He was too trained with the sword. "I offered but we never got around to it. Maybe I'll get the chance when he comes back," I muttered.

"Well I'd love to see him infuriated about how much better the little girl from District 12 is than the big, bad, Career," Dean said, making us both laugh.

"He'll always be competitive about things like that," I said.

"It's the District 2 in him," Dean said, giving me a pointed smile.

"Alright. Come on. Let's see what you've got," I teased.

It was just the way that Dean was. Clove, Brutus, Enobaria, and all of the other people that I knew from District 2. Whether it was with weapons or fighting or simple bets, they always wanted to win and be right. They had the opportunity for love and fun in their lives. It wasn't the way that things were in District 12. We did everything to survive. There was no time for fun. There never would be. Not when we were starving to death and dying in the mines every day.

That was why we had always loved escaping to the woods. Because it felt like we were finally somewhere else. It felt like we could have forgotten everything that had happened between us. It was the one place that we could always be ourselves. And right now I felt like I could be myself. There were no worries. I was just having fun. We were both having fun. It felt like we were actually a real brother and sister pair right now, teasing and teaching each other.

We spent the remainder of our hour firing our bows. For the most part we were using the trees as target practice. Dean wouldn't actually be able to hunt until he had better aim, considering the fact that animals were moving targets. Dean clearly had very good aim but he simply didn't have the experience. I told him after multiple missed shots that he would get much better with time. He was better than average already, likely something that came from his days at the Academy.

Even Cato wasn't half-bad with the bow and arrow. I had seen him make enough shots to know that he was very good. I had come very close to receiving one of those shots. Dean wasn't nearly as good as Cato was, but I assumed that it was because he hadn't trained as hard and he really hadn't trained in a few years. Cato had been training constantly since he was a child. He had only taken a few months off after our first Games together. Dean hadn't trained in almost three years from what I had heard.

For a while I stopped firing and watched him. I sat back on one of the rocks to sunbathe and called out directions to him. I really didn't mean to, but I did laugh each time that he missed. He would turn back and scowl each time that I laughed. He really hated that I could make impressive trick shots - like firing in the middle of a back flip or sliding past on my knees to make a shot - and still never miss. He could have never dreamed of making them. We teased each other for a long time as I continuously showed him up.

The watch on my wrist was the one thing that I kept checking, just to ensure that we weren't going over our time limit. Eventually I had to turn back and warn Dean that it was almost time to head back to District 13. I made a brief promise that I would teach him how to properly hunt next time. This time had been more about learning to properly shoot. On our way back, with Dean now carrying our shoes, I managed to take out a few more animals that darted through our path.

"Damn you're fast," Dean said as I skewered a squirrel back against a tree.

"Gotta be faster than the animals," I said.

"Very good," Dean laughed.

"Here. Wanna see something cool?" I offered.

"Sure."

"Take this." I handed him over a reasonably large rock. He raised a brow at me. "Throw it at a higher branch on one of those trees," I said, motioning to one of the trees off in the distance.

"Okay," Dean said.

He took the rock from me and reared back. I had a new arrow nocked as I watched where he was planning on aiming. He tossed the rock as hard as he could at a tree that was a number of yards away. Just like what had happened with Gale over a year ago, a flock of birds flew out. I immediately took aim. So did Dean with his own bow. I fired one arrow and a second, managing to take the two birds down before the flock got too far away. Dean missed but came very close to hitting one.

"That is a cool trick," Dean said, helping me pick up the two birds.

I grabbed one as Dean took the other, putting them both in the game bag. "Believe it or not, Gale actually taught us that one. Katniss and me. Cato helped me out with it during the first Games," I said.

"I remember that," Dean commented.

"You were close," I said, searching for Dean's lost arrow.

"Thanks. Just gonna take some time."

"Absolutely. We'll come out the next time that I can."

"I look forward to it."

The two of us headed back towards the gates of District 13 when something else occurred to me. The new thing that was bothering me. "Can I ask you something?" I said suddenly.

"Sure," Dean said.

"Do you have any idea what Seneca Crane could be talking about when he says that there's something that I need to speak to Haymitch about?" I asked.

"That could be a large number of things unfortunately," Dean said after a moment's hesitation.

"Something that people wouldn't want me to know?" I clarified.

"That could also be a large number of things," Dean said.

We both snorted loudly. He was right about that. They never wanted to tell me the truth about what was happening. "That's very true. I guess one day I'll have to own up and get back in touch with Haymitch," I muttered irritably.

"Do me a favor," Dean said. I nodded blankly. "Give him a break. He did what he thought was the best for everyone."

"I know. It doesn't change the fact that I'm angry with him," I growled.

"I know, Aspen. We're all a little angry about things. But this is the wrong time to be angry with each other. We have to work together," Dean said softly.

As much as I hated that idea, I knew that he was right. We all had to work together if we wanted this rebellion to end and for us to win. That meant that I had to try and forgive Haymitch. Not necessarily forgive him, but try and learn to work with him. Realize that he did what was right for the rebellion. But it would take a lot of time. We might not ever be able to get back to where we had once been. Almost like a father and daughter. We were almost like strangers now.

The closer that we got back to District 13, I turned back and smiled at Dean. I might not have liked what he had said to me, but I knew that he was right. He wrapped an arm over my shoulder and pressed a kiss against my hair. I laughed as we arrived back to District 13 and headed inside. We had our trackers taken off and put our weapons back in storage in the armory. Just a moment later we turned and headed back into the main halls of District 13.

"You'll be at the assembly later?" I asked.

"Of course. I'll see you there?" Dean asked.

"Yes. But I might be hiding in the crowd," I said honestly.

"That's probably a good idea," Dean teased.

"See you soon."

The two of us smiled at each other as I brought him into a painful hug. It really was nice to be back with him, if even just for a little while. I had almost forgotten how much that I liked Dean. I was glad that Carrie had him in her life. I knew how she felt - falling in love with a Hadley man. I just wished that I had mine back. And I would. Soon enough. Dean and I departed from each other as he headed back to spend some time with his wife and daughter before the assembly later.

For a moment I thought about going to seek out Haymitch, but I really didn't know where he was and I didn't really want to have to deal with him quite yet. I wanted to be petty for a little while longer. So I headed off and went back to my new compartment. Just as I had left her, Katniss was curled up in her bed, fast asleep. I fell into my own and shut my eyes, staying quiet. I was back asleep in a matter of seconds. The next thing that I knew, Prim was waking Katniss and I up for 18:00 - Reflection.

That meant that it was time for the assembly. Time for me to officially become the Mockingjay and for me to become the new most hated person in District 13. As I threw a pillow at Katniss to wake her up, she almost fell out of the bed. Prim told us that they had been announcing the assembly since lunch. The entire population, except those needed for essential jobs, were required to attend. Which made me sick. Everyone there to hate me. I pulled my hair up into a ponytail and nodded.

"Okay. Let's go," I said.

As the three of us stood upright and headed out into the hallway, Katniss wrapped an arm around my waist. "Ready to be public enemy number one?" Katniss teased.

"I'm kind of used to it already," I said honestly.

"Well we love you," Prim said sweetly.

"And that's all that matters," I said, pressing a kiss into her hair.

We followed the directions to the Collective, a huge room that easily held the thousands who showed up. You could tell that it was built for a larger gathering, and perhaps it held one before the pox epidemic. Prim quietly pointed out the widespread fallout from that disaster - the pox scars on people's bodies, and the slightly disfigured children. All of these people here were about to hate me. Maybe they already had. The room had a towering ceiling that made me nervous. I wanted to be back in the woods.

"They've suffered a lot here," Prim said.

My face warped into a scowl. Not at Prim. Not at anything that she had said. She was still a child and a kind one at that. She loved everyone, even the people that she didn't have any reason to like. She didn't like to see anyone in pain. She didn't like to see anyone have any kind of suffering in their lives. But I wasn't that kind of person. I was vengeful and bordering on cruel. And after what I saw this morning, I was in no mood to feel sorry for Thirteen.

"No more than we did in Twelve," I said.

As we moved to our spots, I saw Ms. Everdeen lead in a group of mobile patients, still wearing their hospital nightgowns and robes. Finnick stood among them, looking dazed but gorgeous. In his hands he held a piece of thin rope, less than a foot in length, too short for even him to fashion into a usable noose. There was probably a reason for that. His fingers moved rapidly, automatically tying and unraveling various knots as he gazed about. Probably part of his therapy.

Breaking from Prim and Katniss for a moment, I crossed to him and said, "Hey, Finnick." He didn't seem to notice, so I nudged him to get his attention. "Finnick! How are you doing?"

"Aspen," he said, gripping my hand.

It was the most formal that I had ever seen him before. It was a little strange if I was completely honest. Even when I had never spoken to him before, he had never been formal and had always treated me like we were the best of friends. But the corners of his lips turned up in an almost-smile. He was relieved to see a familiar face, I figured. I moved forward and pulled Finnick into a gentle hug. He responded by gently placing a hand in the small of my back. If I was being honest, I really did miss him.

"You're speaking to me now," Finnick said gently, pulling away from me.

"No point in staying angry with each other," I said quickly. "What's with the rope?"

"Just something to do," Finnick said blankly.

"I understand. You know, I'm allowed to go hunting now. Would you like to come with me one day?" I offered.

Maybe getting out and doing something would be good for him. "Sure," Finnick said.

"It'll be fun," I goaded.

He had never seemed so out of it and careless. "Why are we meeting here?" Finnick asked suddenly.

"I told Coin I'd be her Mockingjay. But I made her promise to give the other Tributes immunity if the rebels won. In public, so there are plenty of witnesses," I said.

"Oh. Good. Because I worry about that with Annie. That she'll say something that could be construed as traitorous without knowing it," Finnick said.

My heart lodged in my throat. Annie. Uh-oh. Totally forgot her. Or did I? I had been so ecstatic and so panicked about ensuring to get Cato out of the Capitol's hands that I couldn't remember who else I had mentioned. I didn't even knew if Coin had understood what I had meant about her. I remembered mentioning Annie to Coin, but Annie wasn't a Tribute. She might have just nodded blankly. Did Coin even know about her? I was going to have to make sure that someone understood what I had meant.

"Don't worry, I took care of it," I told Finnick reassuringly.

Giving Finnick's hand a squeeze, I turned on my heel and marched straight up the stairs. Which turned out to be a very hard task with the concussion and lingering effects of the electrocution. I was almost embarrassed at how weak I was. But I managed to head straight for the podium at the front of the room. I had to pass by Cato's family, letting them know that I was on a mission and would see them soon. They wished me luck. Coin, who was glancing over her statement, raised her eyebrows at me.

"Did you add Annie Cresta to the immunity list?" I asked.

Coin frowned slightly. "Who's that?"

"She's Finnick Odair's..." What? I didn't really know what to call her. Even away from the Capitol's eyes, who was she? "She's Finnick's friend. From District 4. Another Victor. She was arrested and taken to the Capitol when the arena blew up."

"Oh, the mad girl. That's not really necessary. We don't make a habit of punishing anyone that frail," Coin said.

Immediately I started to bristle. What the hell was she talking about? They didn't punish anyone that frail. I thought of the scene that I walked in on this morning. Of Octavia huddled against the wall. Of Venia and Flavius barely being able to look at me. Of how Coin and I must have had vastly different definitions of frailty. Or perhaps it was all because they were from the Capitol. Maybe being from there automatically made you immune to being frail in Coin's eyes.

But I only said, "No? Then it shouldn't be a problem to add Annie."

"All right," Coin said, penciling in Annie's name. So she hadn't been on the list before... "Do you want to be up here with me for the announcement?" I shook my head. "I didn't think so. Better hurry and lose yourself in the crowd. I'm about to begin."

Nodding at her briefly, I turned and practically sprinted away. I didn't want to be right up in their sight. That would have been a terrible thing to do. I wanted to hide at the back of the Collective and make sure that I could run if there was a mob that was going to be planning on attacking me because I was demanding for Coin to save Cato. I made my way back to Finnick, Prim, and Katniss. They all placed their hands on me, keeping me calm for the announcement.

"Good afternoon," Coin started, silencing any conversations. "Thank you for interrupting your schedules. They have already been adjusted to compensate for the delay."

"I hardly ever see children around here," I whispered to Prim, spotting only a few around.

"Please, check in with your unit supervisors when you resume work," Coin continued.

"A lot of them were lost in an epidemic a few years ago. Coin lost her family, too. Daughter and a husband," Prim said.

"I didn't know that," I said, surprised.

Although I supposed it was why she was so nasty about everything. She was still mourning. "I have an announcement for the citizens of Thirteen, and our welcome guests from Twelve and Two. Aspen Antaeus has consented to be the face of our cause to help unite the districts against the Capitol," Coin said.

She was silent long enough for everyone to celebrate what she had just said. I tried to place a smile on my face. I had to pretend that things were okay. I had to pretend for a moment that I hadn't made a deal that would likely make people want to turn away from me again. There was a long period of applause and I noticed that people on all sides of me were sending me happy looks. I knew that they would only be happy with me for so much longer.

"In exchange, I have promised several concessions," Coin continued. "First, we'll assess all opportunities for the extraction of the Victors held hostage in the Capitol. Cato Hadley, Johanna Mason..."

There was a large noise of discontent from the crowd. Coin paused long enough for everyone to complain about why that was a terrible idea. And it might have been. There was a good chance that we could lose a number of soldiers attempting to extract just a few people. But those people - one of them, at least - meant the world to me. I had to know that Cato was alive. I needed him back here. But I was one of the only people who wanted him back. The crowd was not happy, just as I was expecting.

"... and Annie Cresta. Once freed, they will be granted full pardon for any and all crimes committed against the rebel cause."

The new noise of anger wasn't something that surprised me in even the slightest. I could have never said that District 13 weren't passionate about those things that they believed in. They definitely let me know just how much they hated me and what I had made them promise to keep Cato safe. There was an even louder sound of displeasure from the crowd. I slowly placed myself in between Katniss and Prim. I noticed Cato's family placing themselves around me.

Words were not something that were wasted in Thirteen. That was almost all that they said during the assembly. Other than the fact that it didn't matter what damage was done in the rebellion. The Victors would be pardoned. It was exactly what I was hoping for. In the rumbling of the crowd, I heard the dissent. I supposed that no one doubted that I would want to be the Mockingjay. So naming a price - one that spared possible enemies - angered them. I stood indifferent to the hostile looks thrown my way.

It wasn't like I wasn't used to looks like that before. I was more than used to them. They had been thrown my way since I had first arrived in the Capitol over a year ago. And they had been thrown all around District 12 before that. Coin allowed a few moments of unrest, and then continued in her brisk fashion. I watched her hair blankly for a moment. But just for a moment. Because now the words coming out of her mouth were news to me.

"But in return for this unprecedented request, Soldier Antaeus has promised to devote herself to our cause. It follows that any deviance from her mission, in either motive or deed, will be viewed as a break in this agreement. The immunity would be terminated and the fate of the four Victors determined by the law of District Thirteen. As would her own. Thank you for your attention. Please, resume your daily schedules," Coin finished.

Everyone started moving around to head back to their own jobs. A number of nasty looks were thrown my way. But Finnick, Prim, Katniss, and Cato's family stayed with me in the center of the Collective. Because we all knew what her words genuinely meant. In other words, if I stepped out of line, we were all dead.

Chapter 6: Chapter Six

So it turned out that Coin was just another force to contend with. Not that I hadn't known that before, but now I knew the magnitude of how much she was genuinely willing to do to keep me working along with her plans. She was just another power player who had decided to use me as a piece in her games, although things never seemed to go according to plan. They never did and they likely never would. It wasn't like using my life as a gambling piece was something new.

It was something that I had always been used to. It was something that I would always be used to. Although now it seemed to be even more serious. First there were the Gamemakers last year, making me their star. Everything from the fire-ridden costumes that coined the name Girl on Fire, to the perfect score, to making me the most wanted and loved Tribute of those Games. Of course, it had all blown up in their faces when they had been forced to scramble to recover from those two stupid daggers.

It hadn't ended there. That had only been the beginning of people using me as a piece in their own games. Then it had been President Snow, trying to use me to put out the flames of rebellion, only to have my every move become inflammatory. Those speeches in the Districts that only angered the people. The engagement to Cato that seemed to bind us together and ignite the revolution. Cato's shocking revelation that I was pregnant and the way that I used it to my advantage in the arena.

Next, it was the rebels ensnaring me in the metal claw that lifted me from the arena. These people who had brought me here with the intent to have me work with them - without argument and without flaw. They had already designated me to be their Mockingjay, and then they had been forced to recover from the shock that I might not want the wings. They had been forced to bring me back from the verge of suicide, something that no one had been prepared to handle.

And now it was Coin, with her fistful of precious nukes and her well-oiled machine of a District, finding that it was even harder to groom a Mockingjay than to catch one. Mostly because I didn't want it. And I would not just roll over and die for her. I had already done that too much over the past year and a half. She must have seen it in my eyes, because she was the quickest to determine that I had an agenda of my own and was therefore not to be trusted. She had been the first to publicly brand me as a threat.

Clearly Katniss noticed it. The scathing glare from Coin up on the perch. The angered looks of the beaten-down residents of District 13. Katniss laid a hand on my arm and gently started pushing me away. She was probably right to have me get out of the area. I was public enemy number one right now, just the way that she had told me that I would be. Not that it shocked me. Now not only was I a threat, I was a liability and enemy to the cause with my requests.

"Leave. They're looking to you," Katniss whispered.

"See you guys later," I muttered.

There were a few goodbyes said to me, but no one said anything to make us even more easily noticed. It was a little difficult to slip through the crowd, as so many people were trying to stop me to ask why the hell I had requested something like that. I was very grateful when Damien and Dean walked up behind me, removing the rest of the crowd and allowing me slightly easier access out of the Collective. For a while I needed to be by myself and stew in my own thoughts, as I so often did.

Starting to wander through the lower levels of District 13, I realized that it wasn't just the people who were in the Collective. The announcement must have been broadcast everywhere. Because even the workers around the rest of the District were glaring at me. It was the wrong time for me to be lingering around here. I needed to get somewhere private. Especially after I had just essentially made the announcement that I was going to try and save the people who now looked to be Capitol loyalists.

So I turned and left the populated area. I wanted to be far away from here. Far away from the lingering and angry crowd of the Collective. It was going to be dinnertime soon. I knew that. It was just about twenty minutes until it was time for me to head back to the dining hall. But I really didn't want to sit in there with everyone else. I knew that no one wanted to see me right now. They were all angry with me. And, to be honest, I was angry at them too. How did they not understand that I needed to do this?

How could these people have not understood that I needed to go and save Cato? He was my husband, no matter what had happened. No matter how we had been forced into it. I had to save him. After a while I ended up heading straight back to our compartment. I assumed that it was the only safe place for me to be right now. I collapsed on the bed and wrapped a blanket around my shoulders, taking a few deep breaths that I so desperately needed, attempting to find out what came next for me.

What did come next for me? Becoming the Mockingjay? Yes. That was about it. That was the next thing that I needed to do. But there was something that I needed even more. To get Cato back. That was the one thing that I really needed. But how much longer would it be before I could get him back? I hoped that it wouldn't be too long. I wanted him to be back with me. I missed him so desperately. Every piece of me missed hum more than I had ever thought was possible.

Just as I started thinking about being with Cato again, I realized something that I hadn't really thought about before. It was something that I had known would happen, but I hadn't thought about. I was going to have to ask Coin when she intended for the rescue mission for Cato and the other Victors would be. In the meantime, I would need to do everything that she wanted and be perfect as the Mockingjay. It was the only way to guarantee everyone's safety. My own included.

Cato's P.O.V.

The moment that he woke up, Cato cringed. A pain shot through his arms. The same spot that he had so often felt something stab him in. He couldn't have said what time or day it was. Time had lost all meaning in the terrible haze that he had been in. Waiting for the surely horrific torture that was to come, he opened his bleary eyes. He was very vague on what was happening. He didn't even know what his last truly real memory had been. Everything had started melding together.

He didn't know how long he had been wherever he was. He didn't even know where he was. Somewhere white. Painful. Small. He had no idea what was real and what wasn't. He wasn't even sure if this place was real. Everything was so hard to place in its correct spot. Real and not real. He couldn't tell anymore. He barely remembered being able to sleep. It was just a haze where memories were a little blurrier. He didn't even know when was the last time that he really gotten to sleep was.

The only thing that he could do to try and hang onto his sanity was remember Aspen. As frequently as he could. But it was almost impossible. It seemed that each time he tried to remember her, he started seeing some horrible thing that she did to him. He tried to blink away the images - telling himself that they weren't real - but it was almost impossible. He kept trying to remind himself that she is his wife and he loves her, but it's becoming harder and harder. He couldn't see himself with her, happy and in love, anymore.

Why not? He couldn't figure it out. As Cato rolled over, determined to remember her the way that he had always known her, he realized that he was in a bed. For once they had taken him off of the metal table. It was the only form of comfort that he had had in a long time. He groaned as the florescent lights flooded his eyes. But that was also the same moment that he realized that he wasn't in the bed by himself. Someone else was there. It was Aspen.

She was right in the bed next to him. Cato jerked slightly, startled to see her there. She hadn't been with him in... months? Weeks? Years? The Quarter Quell? Was that the last time that they had been together? He couldn't remember when it had really been the last time that he had seen her. And he couldn't really tell if she had loved or hated him when he had seen her last. Aspen's face spread into a small smile as she looked him over. Cato tensed up again, trying to force himself to relax.

She was just his wife. Everything that he had seen before was a lie. Everything that they had shown him wasn't real. She was his wife and loved him. But Cato couldn't stop from staring at her blankly for a moment, just waiting to see what she would do. What she might turn into. What horrible monster was he about to see? Real or not real? Who knew? But after a moment he realized that she wasn't a monster this time. It was her. It was really his wife. She was no monster. She was really his wife...

His entire body relaxed as he stared at her. She wasn't going to hurt him. She was really here and her normal self. Cato looked her over slowly before realizing that she wasn't wearing clothes. The sheet was thrown over her body. Just like that morning before the Quell. The sheet was tangled around her legs and waist, hiked up just over her chest. He almost managed to smile at her, but the pain radiating through his body was horrible. But seeing her the way that he loved her was worth it.

Just like everything that he had done for her before, it was worth it. She had always been worth it. Everything that had ever happened to him. Cato slowly leaned forward and pressed the hair back off of her forehead. It was tangled slightly and she giggled - a sound that he had always loved. She smiled softly and turned into the palm of his hand, placing a small kiss there. She was the love of his life. And she was finally back with him. He leaned forward and kissed her gently, so happy to be with her.

As he broke away from her, Cato started to look around. They were in an unfamiliar room. What had happened since the last time that he was really aware of himself? "Where are we?" Cato asked.

"Home," Aspen said sweetly.

"Where's home?" Cato asked.

Was home District 2? His own home. Maybe District 12? Her home. Either way, he had to make sure that they were safe. "With me," Aspen said, taking her hand and putting it on his stomach.

Cato smiled, gently running his hand over her soft skin. "Are we in the Capitol?" Cato asked quickly.

"You're with me," Aspen teased.

As much as he liked seeing the playful part of her personality again, he needed to make sure that they were okay. "Aspen... Where are we? Are we safe?" Cato asked desperately.

"You'll always be safe with me," Aspen whispered.

"I know," Cato said truthfully.

That was the way that they had always been. They protected each other. They always would. "I've missed your smile," Aspen said, running her hand along his chest.

Cato smiled and pressed a kiss into her clavicle. "I've missed yours, too. I've missed everything about you," Cato said truthfully. He couldn't even describe how wonderful it was to see her smile again. "How did you get here? How long have you been here?"

"So many questions," Aspen teased.

"Aspen... This is serious. Where are we?" Cato asked.

"I already told you. We're home, Cato," Aspen said.

But where was home? "Are we in District 2? District 12?" Cato asked.

They had to be somewhere safe. They couldn't linger in the Capitol. "District 12 is gone," Aspen said, as if it didn't bother her.

Cato's jaw almost dropped. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Her home was gone? She would have lost her mind if her home had been destroyed. As awful as District 12 could be at times, he knew that it meant the world to her. It was the only place that she had ever known. It was the place that her parents had grown up. It was the place that she was from. It couldn't have been gone? What could have even happened to it?

"I destroyed it," Aspen continued.

No... No... She wouldn't have done something like that. She couldn't have done something like that. That was something that the Capitol would have done. Not Aspen. "What are you talking about?" Cato asked slowly.

Aspen smiled brightly, her smile having lost the warmth it had before. "After the Games... After the Quell... When I shot that arrow up into the dome I started something. They dropped firebombs on District 12. Just like I wanted them to. It's gone. So is almost everyone else. All of those people who thought that they were my friends and family. Gone. Just like that," Aspen said coldly.

Cato's heart skipped a beat. What the hell did she mean? What was she talking about? That couldn't have happened. They hadn't done anything to District 12. Not that Cato knew. He hadn't been outside in a number of months. But he knew one thing. They hadn't destroyed it. They couldn't have done something like that. She hadn't done something like that. She loved her home. She would never let something like that happen to it. She would never let the people she loved die. She had always protected them.

"What -?" Cato breathed out.

"Peeta's family is dead, too," Aspen interrupted. Cato's stomach jolted painfully, and it wasn't from the torture this time. His family was dead? It was bad enough that he had died? His family deserved to live. "At least they're together."

Her voice held something of a laugh. Cruel. Something that he had never heard her sound like before. "You're lying," Cato whispered.

His wife wasn't cruel. She was loving. She loved everyone. "No... No, I've never lied to you, Cato. It's gone. All of it. Just ask everyone here," Aspen teased, sitting up in the bed.

Cato shook his head. "Those are your friends... your family... you couldn't have wanted them dead," he said slowly.

"But I did. Just like I want you dead," she said.

Aspen's hand reached over. Despite the teasing look in her eyes, she was as hard as stone right now. It wasn't the way that he had ever known her. She was sweet and kind and laughed at everything. She was a good woman. Not this creature. Not this thing that the Capitol kept dangling in his face. Cato's heart was pounding as Aspen laid her hand on his chest, pressing into the bruises that were littered there. Cato cringed and tried to roll away, but he was too weak.

She had been doing so well. She had been back to normal. Not that he could remember what normal was. There were only little bits and pieces of her that he could remember before he had come here. Everything was so different now. He kept seeing someone who had wanted him dead. Not his wife. Some Capitol muttation, maybe. But now she was back to that horrible creature that had him convinced that maybe Aspen had never really existed.

"Aspen - Stop - Not this again," Cato begged, trying to pull her hands away from him. But she was latched on. "I can't... keep doing this..."

Aspen smiled again, moving to sit over Cato's waist. "Keep doing what, Cato? You know who I am. You know what I've done. You know the type of person that I am. Don't you?" Aspen teased. Did he? He couldn't even remember who she was even more, as much as he wanted to. "Stop lying to yourself."

"You're my wife. This isn't you," Cato begged, placing his hands on her hips, trying to remove her.

"Yes, it is, Cato. You know that it is."

Cato's head pushed back into the pillows. He wanted her gone. He couldn't keep doing this. He couldn't keep trying to remember her one way - his loving wife - only to see this horrible monster. Someone who didn't love him. Someone who wanted him dead. Someone who was willing to destroy everything, just for the pleasure of watching people get hurt. He could barely remember the woman that he had once loved. This was the only thing that existed in his mind anymore, and he needed her gone.

"Why -?" Cato's voice cracked painfully. Aspen's head tilted, painfully teasing. "Why is this happening to you? Why can't I remember you the way that you were?" Cato asked weakly.

"This is the only way that I've ever been," Aspen smiled.

"No, it isn't," Cato said, no longer really convinced of that.

"It is. Don't you remember?" Aspen asked.

Of course he remembered her stabbing him, ripping out his own throat with her teeth, and transforming into that horrible wolf muttation to try and rip him limb from limb. He tried to blink back those memories. He tried to remember her the way that he had thought that she was. That night of their wedding. They had been married, hadn't they? But he couldn't remember it. Where were their nights staying up talking and laughing? Where was any memory of her where he genuinely loved her and she loved him?

"Don't do this," Cato muttered.

"You know that they started enforcing a martial law on District 2?" Cato's head snapped up. "After the Quell ended? I have to say, I wanted something a little more. Maybe like the firebombs in District 12. Now that was a show!" Aspen chirped, laughing cruelly. Cato cringed. "But you take what you can get in this life. Still... It's too bad that their aim wasn't quite right. I would have been rooting for the little one."

His head was spinning. This time it wasn't from the concussions that he had gotten from the endless hours of torture. It wasn't from the lack of food or water. It wasn't from anything like that. He knew exactly what it was from. Confusion. He didn't understand what she was saying. The Capitol loved District 2. They would have never done anything like that. A martial law. And aim? What was that supposed to mean? The little one... Who was the little one? A kid?

"What are you talking about?" Cato asked slowly.

Aspen's smile turned even more. Something that had once made his stomach flutter with excitement now made it clench with nerves. "Want to see your sister?" Aspen asked.

Leah? That was the only sister he had. Unless she was counting Carrie. "Excuse me?" Cato asked dumbly.

"Here's Leah," Aspen hissed.

How had Leah gotten here? It wasn't safe for her to be here. He had to get his little sister out of here. Keep her safe. Clearly Aspen wasn't going to be of help. Aspen jumped off of Cato's lap and leaned over the side of the bed. Cato stared curiously. She reached down for something and Cato jolted when Aspen pulled up a body. A corpse. With a bullet hole straight through the middle of the forehead. It was Leah. His seven-year-old sister. Cato shouted hoarsely, stumbling back and collapsing out of the bed.

His body was throbbing from the fall, but he didn't care. That was his sister. His dead sister. "Leah..." Cato whispered, his voice weaker than he had ever heard it. "Leah!"

Cato pulled himself back to his feet to shake Leah, but it was too late. She had clearly been dead for quite some time. But Cato couldn't stop. He needed her to be alive. That was his baby sister. The one person that he had sworn that he would always protect. But he hadn't. Because she was dead. Aspen had helped kill her. Her skin was a faint gray and her lips were icy blue. Her eyes were slightly reddened. She was dead... She was really dead. A tear slipped out of Cato's eyes as he leaned over his sister.

"She's gone, Cato," Aspen said softly, perched on the edge of the bed.

"Who did this?" Cato asked, his voice shaking.

He would kill whoever did this. "A Peacekeeper with terrible aim?" Aspen offered, cruelly teasing. "Your father, who didn't hold her quite the right way. You, for ever talking to me in the first place. President Snow, for placing the martial law. Me... My arrow."

"You..." Cato tried. Could she have really done it? Was there really none of Cato's wife left? "You wouldn't have done this."

Aspen laughed softly, brushing the hair off of Leah's forehead. Cato instantly slapped her hand away. She didn't seem bothered. "Sure I did. Because I don't care about you, Cato. Not you or your family," Aspen laughed.

"You... You hurt her... My sister..." Cato breathed slowly.

She had really done it. "Yes. And you're next," Aspen said brightly.

That time Cato couldn't stop himself. Damn the way that he was feeling. It didn't matter how his entire body was shaking from pain and how his head was spinning from the lack of food and water. It didn't matter that he had lost almost all of his muscle mass. All that mattered was that he got some revenge for what had happened to Leah. He might not have been able to save her, but he would be able to do something to the person who had ended her life.

As much as Cato so desperately wanted to love Aspen, as much as he wanted to remember her the way that he thought that he could remember her, it was all impossible. He couldn't remember that Aspen anyways. Maybe all of his memories really were fake. So Cato got up from his knees and immediately went to attack her. That wasn't his wife. It was something so much worse. So he launched himself towards her and tried to strangle her.

His hands were almost around her throat when she took out a throwing knife that he hadn't seen before. Instantly she reared back and thrust the knife out. It slashed straight through his forehead, opening up the skin there and causing it to sag down slightly. Blood instantly pooling into his eyes, Cato fell back. Pain was radiating through his forehead as he tried to manage to get back to his feet. Aspen was giving a bored look down to the knife, cleaning his blood off on Leah's shirt.

"Like brother like sister," Aspen sighed.

Cato managed to push himself up onto his hands. "How could you do this?" Cato asked weakly.

"Because I hate you. You will always be weak and pathetic. I can't believe that you ever thought that I would love you. Gale and Seneca Crane... They're the real men in my life. You're nothing," Aspen said.

This was really her. There hadn't ever been a real Aspen Antaeus. She was just a monster. Always had been. "I'll kill you," Cato warned, his teeth clenched together.

Aspen waved him off carelessly. "I'm sure. I'll be going now. But I'll leave her." She motioned back to Leah's rotting corpse. "Just in case you get bored. Someone to talk to, right? Since no one else wants to hear what you have to say. Goodnight, husband," Aspen teased, making to leave the white room.

"I'll kill you!" Cato yelled.

The blood was making it almost impossible to see her. But he felt her lap briefly fall over him. He felt his hands getting pulled back and heard some type of clicking. A binding. It was locked firmly around her wrists and Cato started to scream, desperately trying to fight back against them. He had to get up and kill her. He had to do it for Leah. He had to at least kill the thing that had killed her. It was the last thing that he could do for his sister.

But the bindings that she had placed on his wrists were a little too strong. He couldn't fight back against them. It didn't help that he was finding himself getting a little dizzy from the loss of blood. But it didn't matter. He was going to kill her. Because she did that to his little sister. His favorite person on the planet. His lovely little Leah. The one person that he could remember once loving Aspen. Calling her the pretty girl on the television. How could Aspen have done something like that to her?

It turned out that Aspen Antaeus genuinely was a monster. Not his wife. Never his wife. Never someone that he loved. She was the exact person that the Capitol had been trying to show him that she was. They had actually been trying to help remind him of what she truly was. He couldn't believe that they were telling him the truth about her. His wife was nothing more than another person who made him a piece in her games. It didn't matter what it took. He would kill her for what she had done.

Aspen's P.O.V.

How long had passed? I wasn't quite sure. There was a clock ticking away in the corner but I hadn't bothered looking at it. I liked just sitting here and getting lost in my own mind - trying not to think about what was coming for me. I was pawing at a few crackers that Prim had brought me earlier, just after Coin's announcement in the Collective. I found myself not very hungry, as I hadn't been so frequently, instead thinking about everything that Coin had said. I really should have seen that one coming.

In the back of my mind I knew that I had been a fool for ever hoping to believe that this place was better. I was right all along. Things were no different here than they were in the Capitol. I was still just a piece in someone's games. Just as I had always been. Things weren't going to change. They never would. Not with Thirteen, at least. Maybe Coin didn't want the Games the way that the Capitol had them, but I couldn't believe that things were going to get any better with Thirteen or Coin in control.

But I just had to work with Coin, because she was the only person who had the capability to help me save Cato. And Annie, who I needed to get out for Finnick. I guessed Johanna, too. After all, she had risked her own life to save mine. Not that she had wanted to. But it didn't matter. She was suffering in the Capitol and I couldn't just leave her there. We had almost bonded in the arena, after all. As for Enobaria, I couldn't really care less about what happened to her. But it was only fair to save her too.

Although I was going to hit her as hard as I humanly could whenever I saw her for the first time. For stabbing me. Suddenly my mind turned back to Coin. Was there a chance that she would actually kill me if I deviated from what she wanted me to do as the Mockingjay? Probably. Coin wanted what she wanted and nothing was going to stop her. I supposed that I couldn't say anything again that. I had felt the same way many times before. Suddenly a knock came at the door, interrupting my thoughts.

"Come in," I called. The door opened and Seneca Crane slowly strolled in, closing it behind him. I placed the crackers down on the bedside table. "Hey."

"You should eat those," Seneca said, motioning to the crackers.

"They taste like cardboard."

"Yes. The food here in Thirteen isn't the best."

"Must be even tougher, coming from the Capitol. At least I'm used to the food in District 12, which, honestly, wasn't much better than the food here."

"It's definitely a change. But it's a good one. I like it here better. Less stress," Seneca said.

"Seriously?"

"In a way."

"I think I'm just as stressed here as I was in the Capitol. In District 12. Just in a different way," I said.

"I understand that. You really should eat those. Sooner or later they're going to have you start your Mockingjay duties. I'm not sure what they will consist of, but you'll need to have your strength," Seneca said.

"To stand in front of a screen?" I asked blandly.

"You might get to see some action," Seneca said, grinning slightly.

"You're petitioning to get me out on the field," I put together.

"It's not going well, but I'm working on it."

"Thank you for trying."

"I didn't think you liked sitting here and waiting."

"You're right about that."

He was right. I didn't like sitting here and waiting for word on what to do. I didn't like the idea of being the Mockingjay and only standing in front of computer monitors, reciting rehearsed lines, while people fought and died for me out on the battlefields. I had started this, and now I was in hiding, like a coward. I wanted to leave and be out there with them. I wasn't a politician. I was a terrible speaker. The one thing that I was good at was being a fighter. I was more useful out there.

"How are you?" Seneca asked after a beat of silence.

"Somehow thrown for a loop again," I said, laughing under my breath.

Seneca smiled and nodded. He took a seat next to me on the bed, propping his legs up on the bed frame. "Yes. I imagined that President Coin's words would surprise you," Seneca said.

"Did you know?" I asked, raising my brows.

Seneca immediately shook his head. "No. But I had a feeling that she would say something like that," he admitted.

At least he hadn't known. I would have been a little upset if he had and hadn't even bothered to tell me. "I'm not sure if I was expecting it or not. I guess that I should have expected it," I muttered truthfully.

"She needs a scapegoat if this doesn't work out," Seneca said.

My eyebrows raised. I hadn't even thought about that. It wasn't necessarily about her keeping me in line with what she wanted. It was also about having someone to blame if we didn't win. Someone to blame so that District 13 could go back to living its solitary life. They were hoping that I would be executed and Coin could blame everything that she had done on a little girl with far too much power. I just had to keep remembering that. No one here wanted to help me. I was almost on my own.

"Who better than the person that started this all?" Seneca continued.

"I suppose that's a good point. If I work for my own wants and desires for one second - if it deviates from her own motivations for even a moment - I'm giving up my own life to her. Not that she doesn't already have it," I growled irritably.

Someone always seemed to have complete control of my life. "Just play to her rules for a while longer," Seneca consoled me quietly.

"Rules... Always playing to someone's rules," I laughed.

"Just for a little while longer. If you help us win the revolution, you'll be done," Seneca said. It felt like this would never be done with though. "I can talk to President Coin. Allow you to go -"

"Back to District 12?" I interrupted.

Seneca's face flushed with embarrassment. "I'm deeply sorry," he muttered.

Shrugging my shoulders, I leaned back against the headboard. "That's okay. I forget about it sometimes, too. I'm not sure where I would even go," I said slowly.

"You could always stay here." I scoffed at the thought of living in District 13. "Or in the Capitol. We can try and find you a place to be re-situated," Seneca offered."

That would have been even worse than living in District 13. That was the last place that I could imagine living. "No offense, Seneca, but after everything that's happened to me in the Capitol, I think the last thing that I want is to live there. Too many bad memories," I said slowly.

"I understand. Perhaps District 2."

That wouldn't be a terrible idea. But even that had its own problems. "I'm not sure that would work either. When Cato comes back, he's going to find out about what happened to Leah," I said, cringing at the thought of Cato finding out that his little sister was dead. "I don't think that he'll want to go back to the place that she died. Even if it is his home."

"That's understandable, too. I don't think that I'll want to go back to the Capitol once this is all over," Seneca admitted.

My eyebrows rose. "Really?"

"Yes. Too many bad memories there."

He must have been talking about the constant death threats that he had suffered from Snow over the past year. "Trust me when I say that I understand. Where will you go?" I asked curiously.

Seneca seemed to think on it for a while. "District 4, maybe," he finally said.

"Four?"

As far as I had been thinking, only Finnick and Annie would go back to District 4. "I've always thought that it was the prettiest of the Districts. All of the water. The ocean. It might be a nice place to be," Seneca said.

For a moment I thought back to the Victory Tour. We had just been in District 4 for a day, but it had been lovely. I remembered thinking that it was a nice place. All of the water surrounding it. The smell of the ocean when the breeze would blow, whipping your hair around you. The lovely sun constantly beating down. Being able to swim whenever you wanted. Having enough money to be comfortable but not overly-wealthy. Enough food to never be hungry but not opulence.

Yes. It seemed that District 4 could be a good place to build a life. "It could be a good place to live. I guess I'll just have to think about it," I said, for the first time, really thinking about my future.

I had always been so in the now - thinking that I would die any day - that I had never really thought about the future before. "You could even rebuild District 12," Seneca offered.

"Yeah... That kind of seems like the only place that I could ever live and even have some semblance of happiness," I muttered.

Happiness. When was the last time that I had felt that? There were lots of relatively recent memories that I had of some semblance of happiness. The day that I had found out that Cato was alive. Hunting with Gale, Katniss, and later Dean. The wedding back in the Capitol. That day on the rooftop garden before the Quell. A few moments during the Quell. But the last time that I had been genuinely happy? I couldn't even remember. Probably never. Not with the constant threat of starvation and the Hunger Games.

"I found something," Seneca said, probably trying to distract me.

I appreciated it. I didn't want to think about how genuinely unhappy my life had been. "Oh?" I asked curiously.

"I think you should have it," Seneca said.

He dug his hand down into the pocket of his jumpsuit before pulling out something that looked eerily like the video that Finnick had once handed me of my father's Death Match. My stomach immediately turned in knots. I wasn't so sure that I wanted to watch this. Not if it was my mother's. I could handle seeing my father die. It had been absolutely horrible and had torn me apart, but I had always pictured him as so strong. My mother had seemed so much more emotional. I wasn't sure that I could handle hers.

"What is this?" I asked, my voice cracking.

"Come with me," Seneca goaded.

"Okay."

But I really didn't want to go. I didn't want to see what it was. I didn't want to possibly watch my mother die. Her death could remain a secret to me. The only thing that I knew was what Mr. Everdeen had told me. She had died during the Death Match when she had been caught in an opening by the male from District 2. There had been a little bit of a fight but my mother had been easily outweighed by him. In the end, it hadn't been much of a fight. She simply hadn't been strong enough.

It had been mostly luck that I had been strong enough. And Cato. Cato had definitely helped. Seneca placed a hand on the small of my back and gently pushed me from the compartment. The gesture that had once terrified me and sent uncomfortable chills up my spine was now something that was a form of comfort. He was one of the few people that I now allowed to be so close to me. In fact, I trusted Seneca right now more than I trusted Haymitch. It just went to show how awful my judge of character was.

Of course, the same could be said for anyone who talked to me. I wasn't nearly as good as I liked to pretend to be sometimes. As we walked to the War Room, I noticed a number of people staring at me. Just like always. I knew that Seneca greatly unsettled a number of people in District 13, but they were slowly getting acclimated to having him around. Especially now that his beard had grown in at all parts. He was slowly starting to look more like someone from the Districts. He looked much better these days.

As a matter of fact, if things had gone differently and I had never ended up with Cato - and Gale had been out of the picture - I would have been attracted to him. But that would have been in another, nonexistent, life. As we walked into the War Room, Seneca ordered everyone out. I sat down at the table as Seneca popped the tape into the recording device. I stared at the screen curiously. Then an image formed. It was the Tribute Interview stage and Caesar Flickerman was in the center.

He looked like he always had, but he was wearing a bright pink suit. "What is this?" I asked, turning to Caesar.

"Watch," Seneca goaded.

"Ladies and gentleman," Caesar started, "please give a warm round of applause for Emilia Antaeus!"

My mother... This was her Tribute Interview. "Seneca -" I started.

"Watch. You should watch this," Seneca interrupted.

At the same time, a woman walked onto the stage. Not even a woman. An eighteen-year-old girl. My mother. Whom I was now two years older than. Two years older than she ever got to be. My heart twisted strangely in my chest as she walked onto the stage to a loud round of applause. Her Stylist didn't seem to have been too outlandish but they definitely didn't have the flare that Cinna had. Her dress was a simple black gown that hit the floor, swaying around her feet, with silver sparkles that made the light dance.

As she walked onto the stage, I noticed that she looked much more confident than I had at my own Interview. The first time around, at least. I had almost fallen. She was walking with a confident swagger in her step. I couldn't believe her. How had I come from that confident and smiling woman? She looked like she was having the time of her life. I had seen videos of my own Interview. I had been shaking, I'd been constantly looking to the audience for help, and I had been wobbling in my heels.

But not my mother. Perhaps I'd taken more of my personality and 'charms' from my father. My mother clearly hadn't had enough to eat. I could see the boniness in her body. But, like me, she had clearly made use of living off of the land. She had some muscle mass to her. Her hair was long and blonde - just like mine. She looked like she might have been a little bit taller than me and she definitely had brighter eyes. Hers were a brilliant blue. We did have the same nose. Right now we could have been sisters.

"Welcome, Emilia," Caesar greeted as my mother took his hand and her seat.

"Thank you, Caesar," my mother said sweetly.

"You look absolutely lovely tonight," Caesar said.

"Oh, thank you. I don't think that I've ever worn something quite this lovely. I owe it all to my wonderful Prep Team and Head Stylist. They've really taken everything that I was comfortable with into consideration," my mother said, moving the skirt of her dress around her legs.

It was the same thing that I had done with my flame dress. Caesar smiled, placing a hand over hers. "A charmer you are! Isn't that right? Isn't it?" Caesar asked. The entire crowd started to cheer loudly. Already working the crowd. "It's been an exciting past few days, hasn't it?"

My mother smiled. "They've been busy. But I'm used to busy days," she joked.

The audience laughed again. "Of course! Your lovely daughter, if I'm correct?" Caesar asked.

Did you ever imagine that in just seventeen years you would be speaking to me? "Yes. Aspen," my mother said fondly. Did you imagine that I would be there, mother?

Caesar shifted a bit and waited for the audience to cease their cooing. "Might I ask about your late husband?" he asked carefully.

At least he had been somewhat respectful for that question. "Of course," my mother said.

Not that she would have had much of a choice. "We here in the Capitol remember him well." I could see my mother swallow a lump in her throat. They killed him. They killed you, too. But they will not kill me. "But I do recall during his Death Match that one of the final things he said was that he loved your daughter, calling her Aspen. Was that his decision?" Caesar asked.

For a moment I was grateful for Caesar. Not that I had ever really hated him that much in the first place. The only reason that I didn't actually like him was because of the Games. But I knew that he had been raised on them. He likely would have been quite the good person had he been raised in the Districts. Of course, he likely hated me right now. For everything that I had done to ruin his caliber of life. But I remembered my father. He had looked right into the camera and told me he loved me.

"We talked about what to name our daughter before his Reaping. We had come down to a few final choices. Aspen was one of them. When he was Reaped, we didn't even think about what to name her. My concern was making sure that our final few moments were talking about her. Protecting her. Making a plan. Before he died... that was his final request, I assume. Naming her. So that's her name. Aspen... My Aspen..." my mother said.

Her voice became very weak. It cracked as she trailed off. Her eyes were becoming slightly misty. I wanted to reach through the television and grab her hand. But I couldn't. She was long since dead. Seneca seemed to sense my need. He grabbed my hand and allowed me to squeeze his own tightly. I had wondered if that had been his final request or if they had already named me. At least I knew now. My mother's eyes became slightly misty as Caesar laid a hand on her shoulder.

"It's a lovely name and the right choice. A good final request," Caesar whispered.

"Yes. It was," my mother said, her voice even quieter.

The entire audience was silent. You could have heard a pin drop. "Might I ask where Aspen is now?" Caesar asked.

"Being watched over by my childhood best friend and her husband. They're going to take care of her... just in case," my mother tried off.

Don't worry, mother, they took care of me. I put myself here. "I believe that I speak for everyone when I tell you that I sincerely hope that you get to see your daughter again," Caesar said.

The audience erupted into soft cheers. No, you don't. You were perfectly happy to watch her die. "Thank you. So do I," my mother said softly.

"When she watches this in a number of years, no matter what the outcome of the Games are, what would you like to tell her? In this moment, what does Emilia Antaeus want to say to Aspen Antaeus?" Caesar asked.

Maybe that was why Seneca had shown me this. Because my mother had always wanted me to see this. "That I will be proud of her... no matter what she does. There is nothing that she could do to ever make me love her any less. No matter what happens in the Games, I will always love her. No matter where I end up. She will do wonderful things with her life. I genuinely believe that. With her father's temper. My determination. She'll be strong. I know that she will. She's going to make me so proud one day.

"She already has. Being this young... she'll have already experienced so many things that no one her age should. Losing her father, maybe losing me; no one deserves that. But she'll manage herself. I've left her in the care of the people who I know best. They'll take care of her. And if things go wrong, one day - long from now - I'll see her again," my mother whispered.

Had I really made her proud? Was this something that she had thought would happen? Was this what she wanted from me? She probably would have liked me attempting to end the Hunger Games. That much I was sure of. But she likely hadn't liked this. Everything that I had done to make it this far. What about destroying District 12? Of course, it had been an accident. I hadn't actually done it. But she definitely wouldn't have liked that. I didn't, either.

"You are marvelously well-spoken, Emilia. And I wish you all of the luck in the world. We here in the Capitol are praying with you that you'll get to see Aspen again," Caesar said.

Maybe he was being honest about wanting her to have seen me. But it didn't matter. She hadn't. "Me too," my mother whispered.

"Are you ready for the Games?" Caesar asked.

My mother's face turned up into a smile as she blinked back her tears. "Well there's no turning back now," she joked.

There was a large bit of laughter from both Caesar and the audience. "No, there isn't. With an eight in training, it seems that you're ready to compete," Caesar said brightly.

Not bad, mother. "Oh, I think an eight is an understatement," my mother said slyly.

So that's where my big head comes from. Caesar and the rest of the audience started laughing as he clapped his hands together. "Ha-ha! Well done! Ladies and gentlemen, Emilia Antaeus!" Caesar called, pulling my mother to her feet and raising her arms - just as he had done with me seventeen years later. "Best of luck."

"Thank you," my mother said.

With that, she walked off the stage. Some of the last free moments of her life. Some of the last moments before she went into the arena that she died in. My stomach churned in knots as the screen faded and kicked the tape back out. Seneca finally released my hand. He walked over and took the tape, slipping it back into his pocket. The two of us stared at each other for a little while. It took me a few moments too long to realize that I was crying.

Seneca reached over and brushed the tears out of my eyes. It was a gesture that I normally wouldn't tolerate from anyone but Cato. But he wasn't here right now. And until he got here, I needed someone to be here for me. So I allowed him the moment before squeezing my eyes shut, trying to stop the flow of tears. I had cried so much lately for so many horrible things. To cry over hearing how much my mother had loved me - how much faith she had in me - seemed silly.

"Why show me that?" I asked, my voice wavering.

"You needed to see it. You needed to know that it isn't just us who believe in you. Your mother believed in you." She had at the time. But she had believed that I could grow up and marry a good guy. A coal miner from District 12. Not a vicious Career from District 2. "Right now, looking down on you, she believes in you," Seneca continued.

"She wasn't expecting that I would do all of this," I said, motioning around us.

"Maybe not, but if she were here, she would believe in you. Just the way that I do," Seneca said.

Normally I would have smiled, but right now I felt a little sick. Seneca placed a hand behind my back and started leading me from the War Room. I wanted to get out of District 13 for a while, but I knew that it was the wrong time. I couldn't get out at nighttime. They had already told me that it wasn't safe. And I wouldn't be able to get outside tomorrow either. That was when I would start my Mockingjay duties. Surely something that I would be terrible at.

"Why do you believe in me so much?" I asked Seneca.

"Because I'm from the Capitol," Seneca said. I raised my brows, unsure of what he was talking about. "We cling for something to believe in. President Snow, the Hunger Games, the Tributes, the new Victors... Now I need something new to believe in." Seneca placed a hand on my shoulder. "I found one. The Mockingjay."

A little scowl fell over my face. "It always comes back to the Mockingjay," I snarled.

Always the Mockingjay. Never Aspen. Not for a long time. Volunteer, Tribute, Victor, Mockingjay. It had been so long since I had just heard my own name. "Not just the Mockingjay. Aspen Antaeus. That's who I'm betting on," Seneca said.

A little jolt went through my stomach. It was the same thing that Cinna had said to me a number of times. "You spoke to Cinna before he died, didn't you?" I asked weakly.

"Many of us did. But, yes, I spoke to him shortly before he died," Seneca said.

I wished that I had gotten more of a chance to speak to him before he had died. It had all been so fast. I had been launched into the arena and had never even gotten a chance to say all of the many things that I had wanted to say. I had complimented the dress. I had told him what he meant to me. But he had stopped me - as had the counter for the launch time - before I could say everything on my mind. He had told me that I was his family, though. And I would keep trying to make him proud.

As I walked through the halls towards my own compartment again, I glanced up at the metal walls. "I hate this place," I groaned. "I keep wondering if I'm really just the Mockingjay to these people or if I'm something more. Do they even know my name? Do they even care?"

"To be completely honest, no," Seneca said. I nodded, appreciating the honesty. "I doubt that most of them care. But the way that I see it, there are a number of people who do care."

"Cato's family. My family," I muttered.

Just a few people. Far too few. "Haymitch, Finnick, Brutus, and me," Seneca continued.

"Brutus hates me. Finnick, probably. Haymitch is dead to me," I snarled.

There was no chance that I would ever forgive Haymitch. Not for what he had done to me. "You should really speak with Haymitch at some point. Aspen, the two of you were once extremely close to each other," Seneca goaded.

"Before he betrayed me. He sold me out. He landed Cato in the Capitol," I hissed.

He had helped make true everything that I had feared so greatly. "And he wasn't happy with himself for doing it. It wasn't easy for Haymitch to tell them to collect you first. To go back on his word. But you mean a great deal to him. He wouldn't have been able to leave you," Seneca reasoned.

"He should have told me to stay with Cato. He could have brought us back together," I said weakly.

"Yes, he should have. But he knew that the two of you would leave. Run away. We had to keep the two of you with people who knew what was happening. We had to have people around who could overpower you. Dig out the tracker," Seneca said.

"I know that. But I have to be angry with someone. Haymitch just seems like the easiest person to be angry with," I said.

"He's always been an easy person to be angry with. Aspen, these things happen during rebellions. People must forget their promises and start doing what is best for the cause," Seneca explained.

It was so cold. So cruel. Something that sounded just like what someone from the Capitol would say. But I knew that it wasn't it. I knew that it was just something that happened with war and rebellion. People started to forget their original promises. I had long since forgotten about my promise to only take a life if necessary. How many people had I killed? How many people had I gotten killed? I had married the man that I had sworn that I would kill. But I still wasn't doing what was right for the cause.

I was doing what was right for me. I likely always would. "Rebellion sucks," I said very childishly.

Thankfully Seneca didn't comment on it. He merely smiled, walking down the hallway towards my compartment with me. "Yes, it does. Rebellion has never been something that we loved, but it was time," Seneca said.

Shocking, coming from someone who had once been a Head Gamemaker. Someone who had once loved the Games so much. "Talk about something else. I'm sick of talking about the rebellion," I muttered.

But that was really all that we could talk about. It was all anyone ever talked about. "They're preparing you for Mockingjay duties tomorrow," Seneca commented.

"Yes. Remaking me, just the way that they did for the Games. Joy," I growled.

"You would think that you would be used to it," Seneca teased.

"I doubt that I would ever get used to being poked and prodded and made up for their amusement," I said.

"I hear you've never been cooperative with it."

Had he ever heard about the moment that Cato and I had met each other? I certainly hoped not. It was still a little embarrassing. But it was definitely funny when I thought back on it. I snorted under my breath, shaking my head when Seneca sent me a fond and slightly confused look. No one really needed to know that I had been so uncooperative that I had shouted when having my legs waxed, drawing Cato and his Stylist into the room. The beginning of our once-vile relationship.

"Never," I said, still repulsed by the idea of having my legs waxed again, at a time like this. "But I might have to learn to manage if it means that they're going to go into the Capitol and rescue Cato. I can't keep fighting them on everything." We were silent for a few moments. "When do you think that they'll do it?"

"As soon as they can. They can't risk you getting upset and taking back your Mockingjay duties," Seneca reasoned.

Was there even a way for me to back out of them? "It doesn't seem like I'll have the choice to go back on them now," I said, remembering Coin's words up on that stage.

"Why's that?" Seneca asked.

"You heard what Coin said. If I fail to falter in them..."

"I won't let her hurt you."

He pressed a hand against my forehead, brushing back the loose strands of hair that hung there. "Thank you," I whispered.

"You deserve a happy life," Seneca said slowly.

"I don't think happiness is in the cards for me," I said honestly. It looked like Seneca might have wanted to say something else to me, but he was cut off the moment that we walked back into my room. Someone was already there. "Gale."

He was perched on the edge of my bed, clearly having been waiting for me. "I wouldn't bet on that. Have a wonderful night, Aspen," Seneca said, giving me a quick hug. "Good to see you, Mr. Hawthorne."

"Goodnight, Seneca," I said.

"Night," Gale said blandly.

There was definitely no way that Gale was ever going to like Seneca. No matter how many times I told him that we had moved past what had happened during the Victory Tour. Seneca gave us both respectful nods before turning to leave the compartment. At least Seneca wasn't rude about it. And each time that Seneca and I were together, we found ourselves a little more at ease with each other. We were starting to trust each other more and more. I dropped onto the bed with Gale, who brought out a plate of food.

"Is this your dinner?" I asked curiously.

He would get into a ton of trouble if he was going to hand me a plate of his food. "No. It's yours." I raised a brow. That was against the rules, bringing someone their food. They had to get it themselves. "Katniss caused a distraction in the kitchen so that I could get an extra plate for you," Gale explained, making me snort. "We didn't think that you would want to eat out there tonight."

"You were both right. Thanks for this," I said, taking the less-than-appetizing looking food.

"Our pleasure," Gale said.

He let me eat in silence for a little while. It didn't take me long to eat the dinner. Today it was beef stew with potatoes, onions, and turnips. It was all rather disgusting. It tasted very mealy and didn't have much of an actual flavor. There was even some pea soup. Too bad that I didn't like peas. I wished that we had some bread or something of the likes, but they really didn't have any in District 13. It was one of those moments that I genuinely missed the Capitol. At least they had good food.

"What did Katniss do?" I finally asked.

"I'm not sure, but there was a lot of banging and crashing," Gale said.

We both laughed. I could imagine that Katniss had caused quite the scene. She was fast enough that she would be long gone before they could catch her. "You'll get in trouble for that," I said.

"It was worth it."

"Just think... you might never get that communicuff back," I teased, wrapping my hand around his wrist.

"A truly terrible punishment," Gale said.

Suddenly my thoughts were turned back to Katniss. I hoped that she hadn't gotten in trouble with District 13 for bringing me my dinner. "Where is Katniss?" I asked.

"She had to run and take the long way around. She should be here soon," Gale said.

"Okay."

But it wasn't just a few minutes that passed before Katniss showed up. In fact, it was a number of hours that had passed before Katniss managed to show up in the compartment again. I wished that she would have been here hours ago. She was now the one that was good for defusing the fights between Gale and myself. Just the way that it used to be me who diffused the fights between the two of them. Things had changed greatly since the first Games.

Especially now that I argued with Gale a lot more than I used to. Not that we had always been the nicest to each other. We used to constantly fight with each other. But it had always been little bickering and we would be over it the next day. It wasn't like that anymore. Now when we fought, they were pretty nasty arguments. We wouldn't talk for days and even when we did talk again, they were always very tense conversations, almost like we were walking on eggshells.

When Katniss finally managed to arrive back in the compartment, I noticed that she looked absolutely exhausted. Clearly she had been on the run for a while. It must have been harder than we had originally thought for her to get back here. She must have been running from security for the past few hours. At least it wasn't me. I was always winded these days. I could only hope that the remaining effects from the concussion and electrocution would be gone soon.

Katniss strode into the compartment and instantly dropped down onto the bed. I smiled weakly at her and tossed a pillow over for her to lay down on. As much as I wanted to laugh at her, I was now in a sour mood, just as I always seemed to be. Today it was from the way that my earlier conversation with Gale had gone. It had quickly turned very nasty after our few moments with a joking attitude. Katniss almost instantly took notice that Gale was no longer with me.

"Where's Gale?" Katniss asked.

"Gone," I answered dully.

Katniss scoffed and looked around the compartment. I saw her eyes roll. "Seriously?" she asked. I nodded at her. "What happened this time?"

"Nothing. We just don't see eye-to-eye on a lot of things," I grumbled, not wanting to think about what had just happened.

"And here I thought that you two might have finally been working things out," Katniss muttered.

"We were. Until he opened his mouth," I growled.

"What did he say?"

As much as I loved Gale, he had always been a terrible person to try and have console you. That wasn't the kind of person he was. He said what he felt. "Doesn't matter. I'm sure he'll complain to you later about what I did or said to piss him off," I commented.

The three of us had always complained to each other when one of us had gotten on the other's nerves. Then they would help to get us talking again. It was a constant back-and-forth with us. "He'll get over it. He's not going to start complaining to me. He doesn't want to fight with you. Not right now. Not while you're the way that you are," Katniss said.

"The way that I am?" I asked sharply.

"Stressed. In pain," Katniss said, quickly rectifying her mistake.

Those were two feelings that I had been experiencing for quite some time. They were actually quite different these days. "Believe it or not, I'm not as stressed as I used to be. I mean, I still am. But things have calmed down a little bit. Especially now that I know that Cato is still alive," I said, running the chain with our wedding rings on it between my fingers.

"And you're going to get him back," Katniss said, placing a hand on my knee.

"Yeah," I muttered.

That was the one thing that I couldn't wait for. To have him back with me. Katniss smiled and stood from the bed. "You should go to bed. It's gonna be a long day tomorrow," she said.

"Okay. Where are Mom and Prim?" I asked, laying back.

I hadn't seen them since the announcement in the Collective, and it had been a number of hours. "Mom's in the hospital with Prim. They're taking care of your Prep Team. Making sure that they're going to be healthy enough to help you get yourself together tomorrow," Katniss explained.

"They coming back tonight?" I asked.

They had looked so awful earlier that I couldn't believe they would be able to get over it and come back to help me tomorrow. "Maybe," Katniss said.

"Are you staying?" I asked, tucking myself under my sheets.

"I'm gonna go hunt down Gale. See if I can get him to tell me what happened," Katniss said.

"And?" I asked.

There was no way that this one was my fault. This one was all on Gale. "And I'll reason with him. Honestly, you two are like little kids," Katniss said, rolling her eyes.

"Thanks, Cat," I called teasingly after her.

"Sure thing. Get some rest," she said, turning back to me with a smile.

"Night," I chirped.

"Goodnight."

The door to the compartment closed just a second later. I assumed that I would be alone for most of the night. Which was fine by me. I wanted to steam in my own fury for a little while. Gale could be a major pain in the ass. I really wanted to slap him sometimes. It was clear that we saw so many things on completely different sides. But we had been through so many different things. I had been through the Hunger Games. I had been in the Capitol. Gale never had.

It was the one thing that Cato and I shared that Gale and I never could. I laid down on the bed and closed my eyes, feeling the familiar headache forming at my temples. I was exhausted from the day, even though I really hadn't done that much. It was just the constant stress on my mind, wondering if Cato was alive and still doing alright. I needed to know if they were hurting him or if they were just using his presence to try and get to me. Either way, he was constantly on my mind, even as I went to sleep.

When the next morning dawned, I was only able to get out of bed when Katniss threw a pillow at me to wake me up. Prim and Ms. Everdeen were still gone, likely still in the hospital, taking care of the Prep Team. I quickly changed jumpsuits - not that there was anything different about this one - after hopping out of the shower. Not that I really had a reason to shower. They would likely get me all hosed down again before putting me into the Mockingjay armor for the first time.

Once I was ready for the day, not bothering to put up my hair, I nodded at Katniss that I was ready to go. Not that I was ready. I would never be ready to become the Mockingjay for real. I headed out into the dining hall with Katniss, Gale meeting up with us about halfway. He said hello - and Katniss responded - but I ignored him. As we walked in I noticed a strangely familiar sight. At one of the far tables sat Effie Trinket. My former Escort. I was too interested to see Effie to tell Gale to leave me alone for a while.

"Effie?" I asked.

Dashing over to the table, I carelessly dropped my tray. Effie turned back and smiled happily. "Oh! Well," Effie half-sobbed.

Never in my entire life had I thought that I would be so happy to see Effie Trinket. Gale and Katniss followed, staying just a few strides behind me. As I leaned down, I brought Effie into a lingering hug. It was a little strange to see her. She was slightly more tanned than I had thought that she was without her makeup. And her hair was hidden by some type of scarf. Maybe I would never know what the real color was. I smiled confusedly as we pulled apart and I sat in front of her. Gale and Katniss were behind me.

"I thought that you were still in the Capitol!" I cried, taking her hand in mine. Effie had a hand laid on my shoulder. "I thought that they had to leave you there when it was time to come to Thirteen. What are you doing here?"

"I'm a political refugee," Effie said.

"I'm so glad that you're alright," I said truthfully.

In all honesty, I had thought that Effie would be killed in the Capitol for her association with me. I was very grateful that she was here. "So am I," Effie said.

"I was worried about you. Plutarch rescued you?" I asked.

"Rescued, yes, that's what he calls it," Effie half-laughed. "You and I were both in the dark. Now I'm condemned to this life of jumpsuits."

"Well you still look good in the jumpsuit," I said.

She really did. I just wished that she would take off the makeup and let me see what her real hair looked like. "Thank you, my dear," Effie said fondly.

She finally released me and looked past at Gale and Katniss. Gale had never been too fond of her. He thought that she was a strange Capitol woman, which she was. Katniss had originally hated her, but had learned to have some fondness for her. Effie leaned over and hugged Katniss. She was clearly happy to see her, too. On the other hand, Gale didn't go for a hug, but he did take Effie's outstretched hand and hold it for a moment.

"It is wonderful to see you again," Effie told Gale and Katniss.

"We're happy you're okay," Katniss said.

Effie picked up her water cup. "Can you believe this place? I miss coffee." She slammed it back on the table. "I never knew any place could be so strict. I mean, I thought at least in the higher ranks there'd be some side action. I miss my wigs." Effie gently touched her head scarf, making me smile. "Luckily, I remembered that this was all the rage when I was coming up. You know, everything old can be made new again, like democracy," Effie said, her face falling slightly. "Which brings me to this."

At the same moment, she slid over a folder. The same black folder that they had given me yesterday. It was the same folder that Plutarch had given me yesterday. It was the folder that held all of Cinna's designs. I had only looked through it for a brief moment before the others had taken it back and we had started getting to work. I had really wanted to look through it for a while, though. I wanted to see what Cinna had really wanted for me. Not that he had wanted all of this. Maybe the ends. Not the means.

"Cinna," I whispered, opening the folder. "I didn't really get a chance to look through these."

"He made Plutarch promise not to show you this until you'd decided to be the Mockingjay on your own. He knew the risks, as we all do," Effie said reassuringly.

Instantly I started going through the pages. It almost made me smile. I could see the bits of Cinna in every drawing. His writing, his loops, his favorite colors. And mine. The Mockingjay emblem was on the inside of the front cover. On the first page were color choices, grey and blue and black, and a drawing of my back with what looked to be tactical, decorative, wings. There were even sketches of feathers. On the next page was me in my armor, holding a loaded and drawn bow.

The next page held an extremely detailed sketch of what I assumed was supposed to be my arm guard. It was much more impressive than any that I had used before. I hadn't even used one in either Hunger Games. There was another drawing of me with the detailed padding that would protect me from bullets and knives. On the last page - with a detailed drawing of the chest piece - my hand lingered over his note. The whole book must have taken months. For Cinna...

"He really did have faith in me," I whispered.

"Yes, he did. He believed in this revolution. He believed in you," Effie said.

"They're beautiful," I said softly.

"They have it. They have the Mockingjay outfit," Effie said. I nodded, having already known that. "There's not much of a Prep Team here in Thirteen, but we will make you the best-dressed rebel in history."

Did she not know that my Prep Team was here? Or was she referring to the fact that they were obviously traumatized by living here? It didn't matter. "Let's get to it," I said.

"Come along, dear," Effie said.

Something struck me a little funny about the way that she had said that I would be the best dressed rebel in history. Once a Capitol woman, always a Capitol woman. It didn't matter. I loved Effie in my own way. I was extremely glad that she was safe. Ignoring my breakfast - strangely eager to get to work - I pushed the plate back and stood from the table. Gale went straight to work (I made sure to ignore him) and Katniss left for training with a promise that she would check on me soon.

In the meantime, Effie and I headed off to get to work. A full day of poking and prodding at me, just the way that they had done to me before the first Hunger Games. We headed deep into the underground of District 13. It was a place that I had never been before. I assumed that it was where the entire process would be done to make me look like a proper Mockingjay. I was going to start looking a little bit more like the Capitol darling that I had once been so used to looking like.

We walked deep into some underground tunnel and into a gray room. I stared at it blankly. It looked like one of the rooms in the hospital. Instantly I stripped off my clothing, much to Effie's pleasure. I was just used to it. It turned out that my Prep Team wasn't coming to help me. Not yet, apparently. There were two unfamiliar faces - both of whom seemed to be Capitol refugees. I wasn't sure exactly who they were, but they were much quieter than my own Prep Team. They didn't speak to me. They just worked.

As they worked, Effie walked off to see what else was happening. I was sure that she was checking in with Plutarch and Fulvia about whether or not they were ready for me later. I had noticed that Effie wasn't overly fond of Fulvia. As the two strangers worked I found myself almost missing the constant chattering of my Prep Team. But I could tell that they weren't quite ready to face me just yet. Not that I could really blame them. I wouldn't have wanted to see me either if I was in their shoes.

"Remake her to Beauty Base Zero. We'll work from there," Fulvia had ordered first thing in the morning.

That was when I had noticed it on Effie's face. Her annoyance that someone else was dictating my every move. "You'll look lovely," Effie had reassured me.

"Thanks, Effie. Don't worry. I like you much more," I had whispered. And just like that, there had been some reemergence of the old Effie Trinket with her flashing smile.

Beauty Base Zero turned out to be what a person would look like if they stepped out of bed looking flawless but natural. It was what I imagined that I might have looked like had I been raised in one of the Career Districts. But even they hadn't looked that good upon arrival in the Capitol. Their beauty definition now meant that my nails were perfectly shaped but not polished. My hair was soft and shiny but not styled. My skin was finally smooth and clear again, but not painted. That had been the longest process.

Afterwards they had waxed the body hair and erased the dark circles under my eyes, but they didn't make any noticeable enhancements. That was something that I had appreciated. I supposed that Cinna had given the rebels the same instructions that he had the first day I arrived as a Tribute in the Capitol. Only that was different, since I was a contestant. As a rebel, I had thought that I would get to look more like myself. But it seemed that a televised rebel had her own standards to live up to.

That meant that I had to look like I had the first time that I had been shown off at the Tribute Parade. Effie crossed back into the room a few hours later to track the progress. Not that they had managed to make one. Right now it was all about finishing erasing the marks that had been left behind from my second trip into the arena. There were quite a number. Especially since I had been subjected to a few more brutalities in the Quell than I had in my first Games.

They had been forced to bring in another few Capitol refugees - and Effie - to help erase the scars that had been left behind. Those that had been left behind from the trees and bushes that I had run into. Some of the char marks from the electrocution. The horrible burn across my stomach. The bruises and stab wounds. Not to mention the burned and singed hair from the fire and the fog. It had to be completely redone to appear like it hadn't been half-burned off.

At least it was now back to length that it used to be. Just a few inches shorter. I was back in the bath when Effie returned to check on me again. I was slowly running my fingers through the thick layer of bubbles in my tub. Cleaning me up was just the preliminary step to determining my new look. With my previously acid-damaged hair, sunburned skin, and ugly scars, the new prep team would have to spend hours making me pretty only to then damage, burn, and scar me in a more attractive way.

"How's the Prep Team?" I asked Effie as she came back to my side.

"They're doing better," Effie said, placing herself on the edge of the tub. "Plutarch isn't quite sure that they're ready to work. We're using a few others to try and help you get ready."

"Not the Prep Team, then?" I asked.

"Not today. They need a few more days."

"Who will do it?"

"Plutarch says that they have a team that can make do. The two who were in here first."

"Okay."

They hadn't seemed overly-fond of me, but I supposed that most people weren't. At least there was someone here to help me. Not that I really cared what I looked like. But evidently the rest of Panem and the rebels would. Although I thought that I should look burned and wounded. It would make me look like a real warrior and fighter. It would make it look like I wasn't being pampered while people were out there, losing their lives for me. My idea had been quickly shot down.

Apparently I was too ugly to even consider that idea. Eventually I was led out of the bathtub. As Fulvia said, I looked at least human again. I was sat in a chair with a fabric draped over my chest as they started to make me up. The two people from the Capitol were back with me and standing at either side, wearing the same uniform I normally did. I closed my eyes at the sight of the makeup brushes and felt them moving heavily across my face. It was obvious enough that they had never done their own.

Suddenly Effie burst into the room. "Stop! What are you savages doing?" Effie howled. She snatched the makeup brushes from them. They stepped back as Effie grabbed my face. "This is the face of a revolution!" I tried speaking but Effie spoke over me. "Not some cave painting. Well scoot." The two workers left as Effie called after them, "Have you even ever met rouge?"

"Thank you," I called somewhat awkwardly after the two.

At least they had tried. I closed my eyes a moment later as Effie started to wipe off my makeup. "Don't worry, Aspen. We're going to make this work. For you, for me, and for Cinna. Once I fix this mess," Effie promised.

"Okay," I said, my voice cracking.

For Cinna, I would get over this. Effie started to bring out her own makeup before clearly getting frustrated with the level of work that I required. "This isn't working. Get the Prep Team! Tell them it's an emergency," Effie shouted.

There was a loud thunder of feet as people tried to get the Prep Team down into the room. Evidently I really needed that much work. I wasn't sure if I was offended or if I thought that it was funny. I was stuck in silence by myself as I waited for the Prep Team to arrive. They came in after almost twenty minutes, looking shaken and nervous, but a lot healthier. I smiled and got to my feet, going to hug them. They looked a little terrified of me, but returned the hugs anyways.

"How are you feeling?" I asked them.

"Ready to work," Venia said, sounding stronger than she had yesterday.

"Me too. I promise I won't be a whiner," I gently teased.

For the first time in a long time, I saw my entire Prep Team smile. It was something that was just the slightest bit reassuring to see. It was the same thing that Flavius had told me before my first Games. He had mentioned that it was the one thing that they couldn't stand. At the time it had filled me with fury. Now it was funny. They led me back over to the bathtub and started redoing what the two Capitol refugees had been working on before. Clearly they had done everything wrong.

After I rinsed the lather from my body, I turned to find Octavia waiting with a towel. She was so altered from the woman I knew in the Capitol, stripped of the gaudy clothing, the heavy makeup, the dyes and jewelry and knickknacks she adorned her hair with. I remembered how one day she showed up with bright pink tresses studded with blinking colored lights shaped like mice. She told me that she had several mice at home as pets.

The thought repulsed me at the time, since we considered mice vermin, unless cooked. Most of the animals that they used as pets in the Capitol were used for a meal in District 12. Except dogs. Although I had seen people get a little desperate from time to time. I wasn't sure that I would have ever been that desperate. But perhaps Octavia liked her mice because they were small, soft, and squeaky. Like her. It almost made me smile. As she patted me dry, I tried to become acquainted with the District 13 Octavia.

Her real hair turned out to be a nice auburn. Her face was ordinary but had an undeniable sweetness. She was younger than I thought. Maybe early twenties. Almost my age. It made me sick. Devoid of the three-inch decorative nails, her fingers appeared almost stubby, and they couldn't stop trembling. I wanted to tell her that it was okay, that I would see that Coin never hurt her again. But the multicolored bruises flowering under her green skin only reminded me of how impotent I was.

Flavius, too, appeared washed out without his purple lipstick and bright clothes. He had managed to get his orange ringlets back in some sort of order, though. It was Venia who was the least changed. Her aqua hair laid flat instead of in spikes and you could see the roots growing in gray. She was definitely older. However, the tattoos were always her most striking characteristic, and they were as golden and shocking as ever. She came and took the towel from Octavia's hands.

"Aspen is not going to hurt us. Aspen did not even know we were here. Things will be better now," Venia said quietly but firmly to Octavia.

"You're the only ones who can make me look human again, after all," I teased gently.

Anything to get them to stop looking at me like I was about to hit them. Octavia initially gave a slight nod but didn't dare look me in the eye. Although my comment eventually settled in. They all gave me small smiles. But I noticed that they still weren't looking me right in the eyes. Not that I could be surprised. But I had tried. It was just another of their comments that had once made me want to hate them. After they had prepared me for the Tribute Parade, Flavius had told me that I looked almost human.

"Very good," Effie said, walking back behind me.

"I don't like them hating me," I muttered.

"They don't hate you. They're just afraid. None of us hate you," Effie said determinedly.

"Doubtful," Katniss said, appearing from behind.

"I hate you. Why are you here?" I asked sharply.

"Food time. I'll feed you while they work," Katniss said.

"Thanks," I said.

Skipping breakfast had done me no favor. I was starving from having not eaten all day. Sitting around and being beautified was slightly more difficult than I had expected. Katniss did her job well, feeding me while the Prep Team worked. And she did a good job trying to get them to chat while they worked. Which was good, because it was no simple job getting me back to Beauty Base Zero, even with the elaborate arsenal of products, tools, and gadgets Plutarch had the foresight to bring from the Capitol.

My Prep Team was doing pretty well until they tried to address the spot on my arm where Johanna dug out the tracker. None of the medical team was focusing on looks when they patched up the gaping hole. Now I had a lumpy, jagged scar that rippled out over a space the size of an apple. Usually, my sleeve covered it, but the way that Cinna's Mockingjay costume was designed, the sleeves stopped just above the elbow. It would be seen by everyone if I was on camera the moment that I aimed my bow.

It was such a concern with the Prep Team that Fulvia and Plutarch were called in to discuss it. Katniss was immediately sent out since she came very close to exploding on them about how unimportant the scar was. Of course, I was about to react no better. I could have sworn, the sight of the scar triggered Fulvia's gag reflex. For someone who worked with a Gamemaker, she was awfully sensitive. But I guessed that she was used to seeing unpleasant things only on a screen.

Even Seneca had appeared to discuss the scar. "You would think with all of the injuries that you've seen in the Hunger Games, you would be used to seeing something like this," I commented.

"We're trying to make you pretty!" Fulvia cried.

"Yes, a scar that I received whilst fighting for my life really detracts from my beauty," I growled.

Fulvia's head whipped towards me. "What is that supposed to mean?" she asked.

"You might be a rebel, but you still radiate Capitol. Blind and ignorant to the real problems. Those people out there, fighting for me, will have far worse injuries than a scar on their arms. They'll be missing limbs and eyes and burned down to the bone. This is nothing," I snarled, making sure to shove the scar at her face.

She looked like she was turning slightly green as she looked away from my arm. "You're the symbol of the revolution. We're supposed to be making you look stronger than them. Bulletproof," Fulvia said.

"I don't want to be stronger than them. I want to be down there. With them," I snapped.

"You're perfectly useful right here. Down there is too dangerous," Fulvia argued.

Finally Seneca seemed to think that it was time to interrupt the conversation. "Aspen makes a point. There's no need to cover up the scar. It's almost unnoticeable," he said, pointing to my arm.

But that wasn't the truth either. "Seriously?" I asked him.

"Shut up," Seneca said, shoving my back.

"Everyone knows I have a scar here," I said sullenly.

"Knowing it and seeing it are two different things. It's positively repulsive. Plutarch and I will think of something during lunch," Fulvia said.

"It'll be fine. Maybe an armband or something," Plutarch said with a dismissive wave of his hand.

How could they possibly have said something like that? With a war raging, they were concerned about something like a little scar on my arm. It didn't even bother me. I doubted that it would bother the rebels. They would probably like it. For once I wouldn't look like the Capitol's perfect dress-up doll. But they were still from the Capitol and they were concerned about the way that I looked. Disgusted, I got dressed so that I could head to the dining hall. My Prep Team huddled in a little group by the door.

"Are they bringing your food here?" I asked.

"No. We're supposed to go to a dining hall," Venia said.

Wonderful... That meant that I would have to take them there to show them around. They obviously hadn't seen much of District 13 and clearly hadn't learned their way around the District quite yet. I sighed inwardly as I imagined walking into the dining hall, trailed by those three. I didn't dare sigh out loud. I knew that they felt bad enough right now. I supposed that it didn't really matter. People always stared at me anyway. This would just be more of the same.

"I'll show you where it is. Come on," I said.

The covert glances and quiet murmurs I usually evoked were nothing compared to the reaction brought on by the sight of my bizarre-looking Prep Team. They were even worse than the Capitol rebels. At least they didn't have too many physical alterations. They could manage to blend in. The Prep Team couldn't even begin to manage to blend in. And it didn't help that everyone knew who they were. The gaping mouths, the finger pointing, and the exclamations were awful.

"Just ignore them," I told my Prep Team.

Not that they really looked at me. They were embarrassed and probably still a little fearful of me. Maybe one day they would manage to get over it. With their eyes downcast, and with mechanical movements, they followed me through the food line, accepting bowls of grayish fish and okra stew and cups of water. It looked disgusting but it was something. At least they wouldn't be starving anymore. I assumed that they hadn't been eating much. I could see that they were losing weight.

We took the seats at my table, beside a group from the Seam. They showed a little more restraint than the people from Thirteen did, although it might have just been from embarrassment. No one really wanted to be sitting with them. Leevy, who was Katniss's - and mine, at one point - neighbor back in Twelve, gave a cautious hello to the preps, and Gale's mother, Hazelle, who must have known about their imprisonment, held up a spoonful of the stew.

"Don't worry. Tastes better than it looks," she said.

We were sitting together for about five minutes as the conversation awkwardly dwindled. No one really knew what to say with the Prep Team. But they were trying to talk to them. I appreciated the efforts. Suddenly the rest of the Hadley's came over. They weren't supposed to be over at my table - as it wasn't designated for them - but I appreciated them coming over. Obviously they were trying to help comfort the Prep Team. Even Felix and Marcus joined us, trying to get into the conversation.

"You did well with Aspen," Dean commended the Prep Team.

"Thank you," Octavia whispered.

"She's beautiful anyways," Venia said softly.

It might have been the nicest thing that she had ever said to me. "Thank you, Venia," I said.

"I like the braid that you did. Was that you, Flavius?" Alana asked.

"Yes," Flavius muttered.

"It's lovely," Carrie said.

"Thank you," Flavius whispered.

Everyone had been trying and it had worked reasonably well. They hadn't said anything terrible. But the Prep Team was obviously still incredibly uncomfortable and didn't know quite what to say. We tried to keep talking, but nothing really helped. It was finally Posy, Gale's sweet and adorable five-year-old sister, who helped the most. She scooted along the bench to Octavia and touched her skin with a tentative finger. Thankfully Octavia didn't shy away.

"You're green. Are you sick?" Posy asked.

"It's a fashion thing, Posy. Like wearing lipstick," I said.

"It's meant to be pretty," Octavia whispered, and I could see the tears threatening to spill over her lashes.

Posy considered that and said matter-of-factly, "I think you'd be pretty in any color."

The tiniest of smiles formed on Octavia's lips. "Thank you," she said.

"If you really want to impress Posy, you'll have to dye yourself bright pink," Gale said, thumping his tray down beside me. "That's her favorite color." Posy giggled and slid back down to her mother. I almost smiled. Gale nodded at Flavius's bowl. "I wouldn't let that get cold. It doesn't improve the consistency."

Everyone got down to eating after that. I was grateful for the food. Mostly because I really didn't want to talk to anyone else. Not the Prep Team. Not when I was now thinking about the Mockingjay duties and what was about to happen. And I really didn't want to talk to Gale. Even though I could tell that he wanted me to talk to him. The stew didn't taste bad, but there was a certain sliminess that was hard to get around. Like you had to swallow every bite three times before it really went down.

Gale, who wasn't usually much of a talker during meals, made an effort to keep the conversation going, asking about the makeover. Something that I knew he would never have asked about before. He didn't care. And he normally thought that they were just 'prettying me up for slaughter.' I knew that it was his attempt at smoothing things over. We argued last night after he suggested I had left Coin no choice but to counter my demand for the Victors' safety with one of her own.

"Aspen, she's running this District. She can't do it if it seems like she's caving in to your will."

"You mean she can't stand any dissent, even if it's fair," I'd countered.

"I mean you put her in a bad position. Making her give Cato and the others immunity when we don't even know what sort of damage they might cause," Gale had said.

"So I should've just gone with the program and let the other Tributes take their chances? Not that it matters, because that's what we're all doing anyway!"

That was when I had gotten to my feet, pulled him off of the bed with me, shoved him back outside of the compartment, and slammed the door in his face. I hadn't sat with him at breakfast - only to briefly say hello to Effie - and when Plutarch had sent him down to training this morning, I had let him go without a word. There was nothing that I wanted to speak to him about right now. I knew that he only spoke out of concern for me, but I really needed him to be on my side, not Coin's. How could he not know that?

Thankfully the lunch finally came to an end. It was one of the longest meals that I had ever had to endure. I was so grateful when it was finally time to leave. As everyone got back to their work and the Prep Team headed back to try and prepare the costume for my return to the bottom levels of District 13, I looked down at my schedule. After lunch, Gale, Katniss, and I were scheduled to go down to Special Defense to meet Beetee. I didn't want to be stuck with Gale right now, but I had to get over it.

As we rode the elevator downstairs, Gale finally said, "You're still angry."

"And you're still not sorry," I replied.

"I still stand by what I said. Do you want me to lie about it?" Gale asked.

"No, I want you to rethink it and come up with the right opinion," I told him.

There was a chance that it could have been taken as a joke, but it really wasn't. I meant everything that I had said. He was wrong about this one. I was the one in the right. Everything that I was going to do for District 13 and the rest of the Districts, and Coin couldn't do that one thing for me? Unfortunately my words just made him laugh. I knew that I would have to let it go. There was no point in trying to dictate what Gale thought. Which, if I was honest, was one reason I trusted him.

"Gale, stop laughing," Katniss said.

"What?" Gale asked, looking over at her and smiling. "It's funny."

"And you're not," I barked.

That silenced us all over again. Another day and another fight. I really wished that we could all start getting along again, but it was clear that we were just so different right now. They hadn't been through the Hunger Games. I had. I knew what it was like to take a life. They didn't. I had seen the Capitol and experienced its horror up-close. They hadn't. We were three very different people. The Special Defense level was situated almost as far down as the dungeons where we found the Prep Team.

It was one of the many places of District 13 that I had never seen before. I couldn't imagine how anyone walked around down here. I would have easily managed to get lost. Everything looked exactly the same. It was a beehive of rooms full of computers, labs, research equipment, and testing ranges. When we asked one of the guards for Beetee, we were directed through the never-ending maze until we reached an enormous plate-glass window.

Inside was the first beautiful thing I had seen in the District 13 compound: a replication of a meadow, filled with real trees and flowering plants, and alive with hummingbirds. Beetee sat motionless in a wheelchair at the center of the meadow, watching a spring-green bird hover in midair as it sipped nectar from a large orange blossom. His eyes followed the bird as it darted away, and he caught sight of us. He gave a friendly wave for us to join him inside.

"This is pretty," I said as we walked inside.

"Looks almost like the Meadow back home," Gale commented.

"It used to," I said sullenly. "Wonder why they built it here."

"Growing something, maybe," Katniss suggested.

"Those are all upstairs," I said.

All of the artificial plants and vegetation chambers were upstairs. I wasn't sure what this place was for. But it had to have had a use. District 13 didn't waste space. The air was cool and breathable, not humid and muggy as I had expected. From all sides came the whir of tiny wings, which I used to confuse with the sound of insects in our woods at home. It was almost like being back home, for just a moment. I had to wonder what sort of fluke allowed such a pleasing place to be built here.

This place had no happiness involved. I couldn't imagine why this place had been built. A place of comfort maybe? I doubted that Coin would have been okay with that. Everyone that she had here was for some use. Nothing was wasteful. Nothing was just for comfort. As we walked further into the room, I stared at Beetee. Beetee still had the pallor of someone in convalescence, but behind those ill-fitting glasses, his eyes were alight with excitement.

"Aren't they magnificent? Thirteen has been studying their aerodynamics here for years. Forward and backward flight, and speeds up to sixty miles per hour. If only I could build you wings like these, Aspen!" Beetee cried.

"Doubt I could manage them, Beetee," I laughed.

Definitely I would have flown right into the ground. "Here one second, gone the next. Can you bring a hummingbird down with an arrow?" Beetee asked.

"I've never tried. Not much meat on them," I answered.

"No. And you're not one to kill for sport," Beetee said.

No. I've already done that. Wasn't a fan. "No. I think I've proven that. I bet they'd be hard to shoot, though," I commented, trying not to think of the Games.

"You could snare them maybe," Gale said. His face took on that distant look it wore when he was working something out. "Take a net with a very fine mesh. Enclose an area and leave a mouth of a couple square feet. Bait the inside with nectar flowers. While they're feeding, snap the mouth shut. They'd fly away from the noise but only encounter the far side of the net."

"Would that work?" Beetee asked.

"I don't know. Just an idea. They might outsmart it," Gale said.

"They're fast and small. That would be the biggest problem," Katniss said.

"They might. But you're playing on their natural instincts to flee danger. Thinking like your prey... that's where you find their vulnerabilities," Beetee said.

That was something that Beetee would know about. I remembered something that I didn't like to think about. In preparation for the Quell, and in my childhood, I saw a tape where Beetee, who was still a boy, connected two wires that electrocuted a pack of kids who were hunting him. The convulsing bodies, the grotesque expressions. Beetee, in the moments that led up to his victory in those long-ago Hunger Games, watched the others die. Not his fault. Only self-defense. We were all acting only in self-defense...

Suddenly, I wanted to leave the hummingbird room before somebody started setting up a snare. "Beetee, Plutarch said you had something for me," I said.

"Right. I do. Your new bow," Beetee said.

"New one? What about the one from the Quell?" I asked.

"Katniss will be using that one. With a few modifications from me," Beetee said.

Despite everything that she hated about the Games, I knew that she was excited for that one. Her face broke out into a small smile. "Sweet," Katniss said excitably.

He pressed a hand control on the arm of the chair and wheeled out of the room. I was impressed with his wheelchair and the way that he handled it. I had never been that good with technology. Proof of which had been my first visit to the Capitol during my first Games. I would have slammed right into the wall or ridden off the walkway if I was using it. As we followed him through the twists and turns of Special Defense, he explained about the chair.

"I can walk a little now. It's just that I tire so quickly. It's easier for me to get around this way. How's Finnick doing?" Beetee asked.

"He's... He's having concentration problems," I answered. I didn't want to say he had a complete mental meltdown.

"Concentration problems, eh?" Beetee smiled grimly. "If you knew what Finnick's been through the last few years, you'd know how remarkable it is he's still with us at all." I didn't bother mentioning that I knew exactly what he had been through. I'd been there myself. "Tell him I've been working on a new trident for him, though, will you? Something to distract him a little."

Distraction seemed to be the last thing Finnick needed, but I promised to pass on the message. I noticed Katniss and Gale giving me looks - probably wondering what Beetee was talking about - but I didn't look back at them. I didn't want to admit that what had happened to me, evidently happened all the time. Four soldiers guarded the entrance to the hall marked Special Weaponry. Checking the schedules printed on our forearms was just a preliminary step.

There must have been something quite magnificent in there. Because we also had fingerprint, retinal, and DNA scans, and had to step through special metal detectors. Beetee had to leave his wheelchair outside, although they provided him with another once we were through security. I found the whole thing bizarre because I couldn't imagine anyone raised in District 13 being a threat the government would have to guard against. Had those precautions been put in place because of the recent influx of immigrants?

At the door of the armory, we encountered a second round of identification checks - as if my DNA might have changed in the time it took to walk twenty yards down the hallway - and were finally allowed to enter the weapons collection. Now I understood why they had so many guards and so many precautions to keep people from entering the room. Even I had to admit that the arsenal took my breath away. Row upon row of firearms, launchers, explosives, and armored vehicles.

"Of course, the Airborne Division is housed separately," Beetee told us.

"Of course," I said, as if that would be self-evident.

Most of the weapons in here I couldn't even begin to understand how to use. I had never seen that many guns. Just the ones that Peacekeepers used. There had never been battles before this. There had never been any reason to use weapons like this. I couldn't know where a simple bow and arrow could possibly find a place in all of that high-tech equipment, but then we came upon a wall of deadly archery weapons. Nothing that I had ever seen before.

The bow and arrow sets in the Capitol at the Training Center were nothing like the ones down here. Those were impressive, but not like this. I had played with a lot of the Capitol's weapons in training, particularly before the Quarter Quell, but none of them had been designed for military combat. They were more for show. Dangerous and evident. I focused my attention on a lethal-looking bow so loaded down with scopes and gadgetry, I was certain that I couldn't even lift it, let alone shoot it.

"Gale, maybe you'd like to try out a few of these," Beetee said.

"Seriously?" Gale asked.

"You'll be issued a gun eventually for battle, of course. But if you appear as part of Aspen's team in the propos, one of these would look a little showier. I thought you might like to find one that suits you," Beetee said.

"Yeah, I would," Gale said.

He looked quite excited. It almost made me smile. Almost. But I was still angry with him. Although I couldn't deny that it was nice that Gale was finally seeing something that might have made him a little more comfortable here in District 13. At least one of us could be comfortable. Gale's hands closed around the very bow that caught my attention a moment ago, and he hefted it onto his shoulder. He pointed it around the room, peering through the scope.

"That doesn't seem very fair to the deer," I said.

"Wouldn't be using it on deer, would I?" Gale answered.

"I'll be right back," Beetee said.

We watched him head off. I watched curiously to see what he was doing. I assumed that he was going to go and get the bow that I had used in the Quarter Quell for Katniss. I knew that she would love it. I had let her use it during our hunting trip the other day. But what about my new bow? I had to admit that I was excited about it. In the meantime, Gale was messing with his new bow. Beetee pressed a code into a panel, and a small doorway opened. I watched until he had disappeared and the door was shut.

"So, it'd be easy for you? Using that on people?" I asked.

"I didn't say that." Gale dropped the bow to his side. "But if I'd had a weapon that could've stopped what I saw happen in Twelve... if I'd had a weapon that could have kept you out of the arena... I'd have used it."

"Me, too," I admitted.

"I think we all would have," Katniss said.

We fell silent after that. For them, taking a life was speculative. It wasn't for me. I knew the truth. But I didn't know how to tell them about the aftermath of killing a person. About how they never truly left you. How you would hear their screams and relive their last moments, time and time again. Especially when they were innocent. Especially when you were forced into it. I didn't want to tell them about the eyes that still appeared in my nightmares and the screams that echoed in my memory.

Shaking off the memories of all of the people who had died - all of those lives that I had taken - I tried to think about anything else. How about the weapon that's sure to help you kill even more people? Nope, that wasn't it either. But that was the only thing on my mind at the moment. A few minutes later, Beetee wheeled back in with a two tall, black rectangular cases awkwardly positioned between his footrest and his shoulder. He came to a halt and tilted it towards us.

"For you two. Katniss's is on top," Beetee said.

She slowly opened hers, revealing the black bow that I had used in the Quell. "It's amazing," Katniss said fondly.

"Treat it well. That thing saved my life," I said.

"Absolutely," Katniss said.

"Now yours, Aspen," Beetee said.

He tilted the other case towards me and I took it. It was just a tiny bit larger than the one that Katniss had just taken. I couldn't imagine that it would get much bigger. The one that I had used inside the arena was already almost too large for me. I wasn't that large of a person. I set the case flat on the floor and undid the latches along one side. The top opened on silent hinges. Inside the case, on a bed of crushed maroon velvet, laid a stunning black bow, somewhat similar to the one that Katniss now had.

"Oh," I whispered in admiration.

Slowly I lifted it carefully into the air to admire the exquisite balance, the elegant design, and the curve of the limbs that somehow suggested the wings of a bird extended in flight. Beetee must have worked with Cinna on it. It was a recurve bow, perfectly molded to my stance and height. There was something else, too. I had to hold very still to make sure that I wasn't imagining it. No, the bow was alive in my hands. I pressed it against my cheek and felt the slight hum travel through the bones of my face.

"What's it doing?" I asked.

"Saying hello," Beetee explained with a grin.

"Hello?" Katniss asked, speaking before I could.

"It heard your voice," Beetee said.

"It recognizes my voice?" I asked.

"Only your voice," Beetee explained. "You see, they wanted me to design a bow based purely on looks. As part of your costume, you know? But I kept thinking, what a waste. I mean, what if you do need it sometime? As more than a fashion accessory? So I left the outside simple, and left the inside to my imagination. Best explained in practice, though. Want to try those out?"

"Hell yeah, I do," I said excitedly.

"Katniss, I've taken the same liberties with Aspen's bow from the Quarter Quell. A little less flashy, but no less impressive," Beetee told her.

"Thank you," Katniss said happily.

So we went to practice. I knew that each of us were more excited to practice with the bows than we had been in a long time. This was one of the most fun times that I had had in a long time. A target range had already been prepared for us. It was extremely long and seemed to have stone walls. Enough to make sure that we couldn't destroy the area. It made me laugh. They had definitely taken enough precautions with me here. I had been known to destroy things from time to time.

The arrows that Beetee designed were no less remarkable than the bow. Between the two, all three of us could shoot with accuracy over one hundred yards. It was the furthest that we had ever been able to shoot. The variety of arrows - razor sharp, incendiary, explosive - turned the bow into a multipurpose weapon. Each one was recognizable by a distinctive colored shaft. I had the option of voice override at any time, but had no idea why I would use it.

To deactivate the bow's special properties, I needed only tell it, 'Good night.' Then it would go to sleep until the sound of my voice woke it again. Katniss and I stayed for a few extra minutes to play with the arrows. The incendiary arrows could easily melt targets made out of the strongest synthetic materials and burn through metal. The explosive arrows could trigger what appeared to be a small bomb, particularly if Katniss and I shot two to the same place at the same time. We both laughed at that.

For the first time in a while, I was in good spirits by the time I got back to the Prep Team, leaving Beetee, Gale, and Katniss behind. I wanted her with me, but she had her own training to attend to. I sat patiently through the rest of the paint job and donned my costume, which now included a bloody bandage over the scar on my arm to indicate I had been in recent combat. I thought that it was pathetic and cruel to the real fighters, but I lost the argument against it. Venia affixed my Mockingjay pin over my heart.

It stood out starkly against the all-black suit. The entire thing was incredible. My hair was in a fancier braid than it had been in a long time. It was very pretty and had delicately curled pieces falling out, like I had just gone for a run. My makeup was subtle but dark enough to tell that something had been done. The costume itself had all of the lines of a Mockingjay's body. The padding on the back was designed like Mockingjay wings but had a practical purpose. It was armor to protect a shot to my spine.

The entire costume reminded me that it was like I was going to be heading straight into war. People were really going to be trying to kill me. Far more than just twenty-three people. I took up my bow and the sheath of normal arrows that Beetee made, knowing they would never let me walk around with the loaded ones. Which was probably a good idea, since I didn't have the best temper in the world. I was also holding some weird pole, which would apparently simulate a Panem flag.

Then we were out on the sound stage, where I seemed to stand for hours while they adjusted makeup and lighting and smoke levels. I really wanted to be back out on the practice range. Eventually, the commands coming via intercom from the invisible people in the mysterious glassed-in booth became fewer and fewer. Fulvia and Plutarch spent more time studying and less time adjusting me. Finally, there was quiet on the set. For a full five minutes I was simply considered, feeling very awkward.

Then Plutarch said, "I think that does it."

Effie beckoned over to a monitor. They played back the last few minutes of taping and I watched the woman on the screen. Her body seemed larger in stature, more imposing than mine. Her face was smudged but sexy. Her brows were a deep blonde and drawn in an angle of defiance. Wisps of smoke - suggesting that she had either just been extinguished or was about to burst into flames - rose from her clothes. I didn't know who that person was. Effie walked over towards me.

"Cinna's final touch," she said, pinning a pure black Mockingjay pin on my shoulder strap. I smiled.

Finnick, who had been wandering around the set for a few hours, came up behind me and said with a hint of his old humor, "They'll either want to kill you, kiss you, or be you."

"My thoughts, exactly," Effie chirped.

"I'm not so sure that's reassuring," I teased.

Everyone was so excited and so pleased with their work. It was rather impressive. I looked much better than I had in a number of weeks. Since before the Games had started. It was nearly time to break for dinner, but they insisted that we continued. Tomorrow we would focus on speeches and interviews and have me pretend to be in rebel battles - which I hated. Today they wanted just one slogan, just one line that they could work into a short propo to show to Coin.

"People of Panem, we fight, we dare, we end our hunger for justice!"

That was the line. I could tell by the way that they presented it to me that they had spent months, maybe years, working it out and were really proud of it. That was the only reason that I didn't laugh at it. It seemed like a mouthful to me, though. And stiff. I couldn't imagine actually saying it in real life - unless I was using a Capitol accent and making fun of it. Like when Gale, Katniss, and I used to imitate Effie Trinket's 'May the odds be ever in your favor!'

But Fulvia was right in my face, describing a battle that I had just been in, and how my comrades-in-arms were all lying dead around me, and how, to rally the living, I must turn to the camera and shout out the line. But I couldn't imagine doing that. It was going to be mortifying. But it didn't matter. I was hustled back to my place by Effie, and the smoke machine kicked in. Blue lights were surrounding me up on the platform, but that was it. Nothing else for me to work with.

"Perfect. Absolutely perfect. Okay, let's bring up the setting," Plutarch said over the speakers.

Effie suddenly darted off of the set. I could see Plutarch, Fulvia, Finnick, and a few others watching from behind the glass booth. Funnily enough, I felt more on display right now than I ever had during the Hunger Games or my time in the Capitol. The lights all darkened and I could hear some electrical whirring. I knew that the images were coming up on their own computers. It must have looked impressive. I could see them all smiling at each other.

"Huh," Plutarch muttered. I tried to look behind me, but all I saw were the blue lights. I accidentally banged the pole on the ground and jumped slightly. "A little wind." The wind machines were turned on and I almost stumbled back. It felt strange. Artificial. "Okay, Aspen, we're gonna start you down on one knee."

"Okay," I said.

"And as you rise up, you're gonna hold your flag in the air and deliver your line." At the same time, I rose the pole into the air before lowering it again. "And remember you've just stormed the outskirts of the Capitol arm-in-arm with your brothers and sisters," Plutarch instructed.

The whole thing seemed strange and awkward to me, but I nodded anyways. "Okay," I muttered, getting down onto one knee.

Do it for Cato. "Whenever you're ready," Plutarch said.

Someone else called for quiet, the cameras started rolling, and I heard, "Action!"

Thankfully Plutarch was giving me a moment to regain myself, because the call of action made me jump slightly. At least in the Capitol I was allowed to say what I was thinking. Sort of. They had all come at least somewhat from my own mind. The premeditated line seemed to stiff to me that I knew I would look like a fool delivering it. But I was determined to try. So I rose to my feet and thrust the flagpole into the air. It didn't help that I stumbled slightly getting up.

"People of Panem, we fight, we dare, we..."

Instantly I knew that I sounded like a complete fool. My words were stiff and I was stumbling over myself. I wasn't looking into the camera and my feet were shuffling slightly. There were too many repeats of the word 'we' in the sentence. It was confusing. And it didn't sound like anything that anyone in reality would say or accept. People would hate me if I said that. Then I forgot the rest of the line and simply resorted to staring blankly into the camera. What the hell was it?

"Does she know the line?" Plutarch asked.

"I know. I know it. I got it. I'm sorry," I said quickly.

"Okay. Alright. Let's do it again," Plutarch said.

"She's warming up," Effie told Plutarch.

Slowly I got back down onto one knee again. "Alright. Okay," Plutarch said, not sounding at all convinced. I wasn't either. "With energy. Go."

Instantly I rose back to my feet again. "People of Panem, we fight! We dare to end this hunger for justice!" I shouted.

The moment that the words escaped my mouth, I knew that they came off as unnatural and awkward again. "You've just been in battle!" Plutarch shouted. I jumped slightly, having not expected that reaction. "I'm sorry. Excuse my outburst. You've just been in battle. Let's try it again. Whenever you're ready."

So once more I got back into position, hesitated a moment, and got back to my feet. "People of Panem, we fight! We dare to end this hunger for justice!" I shouted, mustering up as much anger as I could.

In the distance I could hear Effie give somewhat of a groan. I could see Plutarch's disappointed face. I knew that I had come off as awkward and unconvincing, yet again. I would keep doing it over and over again. Cato was the actor. Not me. No one yelled at me this time. Instead there was a dead silence on the set. It went on. And on. Finally there was an acerbic laughter that I was all too familiar with. Haymitch had entered the room and was slowly and teasingly clapping his hands together. I lowered the flagpole.

Haymitch managed to contain himself just long enough to say, "And that, my friends, is how a revolution dies."

Chapter 7: Chapter Seven

My heart dropped into my stomach. A moment later I felt it bubbling with fury. Not that Haymitch was laughing at me. There was a good chance that if Katniss or Gale were here, they would have been laughing too. Normally even I would have been laughing. But now it was no laughing matter. So I just stared at Haymitch, my eyes narrowing. I couldn't believe that he was here, now, of all times. Not even to say anything cruelly helpful - like he was so known to do. He was just to make me sound like a fool.

Haymitch looked back at the booth with a smirk before turning back and striding up to me. "Hello, Aspen," Haymitch drawled.

He was standing less than five feet away from me, just in front of where Effie was (who was watching us with concerned eyes). I knew that it was my invitation to say something. Scream, punch him, or start our typical sneering banter. But I just stared at him blankly. My words had died in my throat. What did I have to say to him? Nothing good. I was infuriated that he was here, standing in front of me, treating me like I had no reason to be angry with him. I had all of the reason in the world.

"Is this how you greet an old friend?" Haymitch continued, sensing that I wouldn't speak.

Haymitch pulled out something that looked like an old rag. "Maybe I don't recognize you sober," I sneered.

We weren't even close to being friends right now. Far from it. It wasn't the best insult - not nearly mean or conniving enough - but it was the only thing that I could think to say. Because the only other thing I wanted to do was attack him. So I merely stared angrily at him. He was such an asshole. I knew that Seneca had been telling me to get along with him again, but I couldn't. I couldn't force myself to be okay with him right now. As I glared at him, Haymitch blew his nose loudly into the rag.

"I guess it looks as bad as it feels," Haymitch said, on the verge of grinning.

That was where I drew the line. I could tell what that face was for. He was waiting for me to start the fight. He was waiting for me to start yelling at him - as I was so known to do - just so that he could turn the conversation around. Something that would likely end up being correct - as I hated to admit it, he so often was. No more of him making me look like the bad guy here. I had always been trying to do the right thing. He was the one who had messed it all up.

Without having anything else to say - and not wanting to have to see him any longer or hear him berate me for my poor choices - I decided to take matters into my own hand. I couldn't do anything worthwhile here anyways. So I angrily tossed down the metal pipe. It flew across the room and clattered loudly. There was a sudden eruption of noise from all around the room as the door to the booth opened and people came running out to try and regain control of the propo shoot.

But there was nothing that they could say that would stop me from leaving. I couldn't stand here and watch or listen to Haymitch any longer. So I turned and sprinted from the room. I was fast enough that no one was able to catch me. They merely shouted after me to come back, but I completely ignored them. I didn't want to have to talk to them. It helped that Seneca told the others to leave me be for a little while to regain my bearings.

As I walked out into the hallway I blew through the crowd. A few people jumped away from me, some shouted about my carrying a weapon, others tried to stop me, and a number tried to ask what had happened. But I ignored them all. As I walked I threw the bow over my shoulders, locking it against my sheath of fake arrows. I knew that I shouldn't have been holding it out in the open, but I didn't care. I just wanted to leave. But my fury did cause me to slam right into someone.

"Watch where you're f -" I seethed, before realizing that it was Alana and Carrie, with Marley in her mother's arms. I forced myself to calm down. "Sorry."

Neither women looked upset with me. "Bad day?" Carrie guessed.

"Honestly, when have I had a good one recently?" I asked.

They both ended up smiling. Marley was chirping happily at me so I reached over and grabbed her, setting her on my hip, allowing her to play with the braid that was hanging over my chest. I smiled and pushed the hair back off of her forehead. She looked a little confused at the sight of me, but also rather fascinated. Although I did have to stop her from trying to grab onto the arrows - despite the fact that they were fake, they could still end up hurting her.

"You look quite dangerous," Alana finally said.

"Yeah, I guess I look the part," I said carelessly.

"Want to talk about it?" Carrie offered.

"Evidently I can't act," I commented.

"Is that what they want you to do?" Alana asked confusedly.

"Yes. I had to stand in that stupid room. There's nothing in there but blue lights and a ton of people standing and staring at me. A pole that's supposed to simulate a flag. Nothing else. Just wind machines and one line that I have to recite. People of Panem, we fight, we dare, we end this hunger for justice," I said, my voice rather deadened instead of awkward and clumsy like before. "That's it. That's all I have to say, and I can't even do that."

The two women exchanged a look with each other. Both looked rather confused. "Seriously? That's what they want you to say?" Carrie asked.

"Yes."

"That's so... stiff," Carrie said slowly.

"That's what I said, and I can't manage it. It's ridiculous," I groaned.

"Was it really that bad?" Alana asked.

I laughed humorlessly. It had definitely been worse than bad. "I saw Haymitch for the first time today," I said. The women exchanged another look. "He walked into the room after my third try, laughing and clapping. His exact words? That's how a revolution dies."

At least they didn't laugh. "Don't listen to Haymitch. He's grouchy and still irritable over being sober," Alana said.

"There are things far worse than Haymitch having to be sober," I snapped, before I could think better of my words. "Sorry. I didn't mean that."

"It's alright. We know that things are tense right now," Alana said, placing a hand on my shoulder.

Things had never been quite so tense in my life before. And I was used to tenseness. "I can't do this. I'm not an actor. I couldn't do it during the Games and I can't do it now," I groaned, remembering all of the times that Cato had been the one to speak for me. "I can't just stand up there and recite rehearsed lines. That's not who I am."

"Unfortunately that's what you promised Coin that you would do," Carrie said softly.

Obviously she was trying very hard not to annoy me. "I promised her that I would be the Mockingjay. I thought that I would... I don't know. Fight?" I offered, unsure of what I had ever really thought that being the Mockingjay would entail.

"I doubt they want to risk your life," Alana said.

"I'd rather do that than stand up there and sound like a fool," I muttered.

"It's safer for you here," Carrie insisted.

Although the scathing glares that I was getting from the District 13 citizens told me that it might not have been completely true. "Now I'm not so sure about that," I muttered.

"Aspen, may we speak?" Seneca asked, appearing from behind me.

He must have finally found me after I had darted from the room. "If you tell me how terrible my acting is or how I've just ruined the rebellion, I'm going to scream. And I might shoot you," I warned, reaching back and placing a hand on my bow.

"That wasn't what I was going to say," Seneca countered quickly.

"I was," Brutus said, appearing at my other side.

My jaws closed. I hadn't seen Brutus in a while and I had been perfectly happy with that. Despite the few moments that the two of us managed to get along, there were plenty more times that he annoyed me. I was sure that he was here right now to tell me what a miserable job I had done with the propo. He'd probably already managed to hear about it. I grit my teeth and handed Marley back to Carrie, sensing that I might attack Brutus at any given second.

"What are you even doing here?" I sneered.

Brutus smirked and walked in a slow circle around me. "You look like a rebel. You look like the Mockingjay," he said, coming back to stand in front of me. "But you sure as hell can't act like one."

"Here I thought that we might have been getting along for a little while there," I groaned.

Brutus scoffed. "I think not, Mockingjay. We'll figure something out tomorrow. There's no way that they can let that out," Brutus said, almost adopting a friendly attitude.

"Have you already seen it?" I asked.

"I think everyone's seen it," Brutus laughed.

There was a good chance that they would be playing it on a loop for everyone to laugh at. "Wonderful," I groaned.

Sensing that the tension in the air was too thick, Seneca placed a hand on my shoulder and gently pulled me back. "Might I have a word with Aspen?" Seneca asked.

"Please. Let's go," I said, grabbing his arm and pulling him along. "I'll talk to you two later."

Both Alana and Carrie smiled and nodded. "Take it easy, Aspen. Things are going to be okay. One bad performance doesn't mean that your time as the Mockingjay or the rebellion are over. They'll figure out something to do with it tomorrow," Alana said reassuringly.

"Thanks, Alana. Shall we?" I asked Seneca.

"Of course."

The two of us instantly moved off to get away from the others. Which was good, seeing as they were talking too much. I wanted to steam for a while. So Seneca and I walked out of the main gathering of District 13. I didn't want to talk to anyone, see their faces, or be out in public. There was a good chance that the rumor of how terribly I had done in my first officially sanctioned Mockingjay duty would spread quickly. I didn't want to have to face everyone after that came out.

"Where are we going?" I finally asked.

"Special Weapons Defense," Seneca explained.

"Why?"

"Because you're really not supposed to be carrying that around," Seneca said, motioning to the bow and arrow sheath that were thrown over my shoulder.

"Right," I said, remembering that I wasn't supposed to have them on me. "I get so used to having it with me."

"You can have it back tomorrow when we all go and talk about it. They're going to put you back in the Mockingjay suit, too."

"Well, I hate to say it, but I do kind of like the suit," I said, running my hands down the chest protector.

"Of course. Cinna designed it."

"I can tell." Every inch of the outfit screamed that it had been designed by Cinna. His personal touch was all over the place. It echoed through every inch of the outfit. "There are little pieces of him all over it. Not only that, but it fits exactly the kind of way that I wanted it. Covering up almost everything," I said.

"There's no need to make you attractive to anyone," Seneca said.

"Oh?" I asked curiously.

Suddenly I was thrown back to the time before either one of us had been on the same page. The time before I had really trusted him. I thought back to that man who had thought that I was gorgeous and constantly looked for some reason to be alone with him. Despite the fact that we were on much better terms now, it seemed strange that his words were coming from someone who had once thought that I was so attractive. And maybe still did.

"You're the Mockingjay. A warrior. Not to mention that you're married," Seneca said.

It was something close to a joke. I wanted to smile, but I couldn't force myself to. "It was just a sham put together by the Capitol," I muttered sadly.

"Does that change things between the two of you?"

"No."

Seneca gave me a once over as we headed down another hallway. "You look like you're thirty," Seneca said.

Will I even make it to thirty? "Do I?" I asked slowly.

Seneca smiled and nodded, motioning over the length of my body, not in a creepy manner. "The makeup. The costume. The hair. It makes you look far older than you really are. I think sometimes we all forget that you're barely twenty. Not long ago you were still a child," Seneca explained.

He was right. Two years ago I had been a dependent. It really hadn't been that long at all. But there was one truth. "I was never really a child," I muttered.

"That is true. Perhaps you'll at least get to be a young adult when this is all over."

"If I think my nightmares are bad now... I can't imagine what they'll all be like when this is over."

I wouldn't only have the fear of the Games and President Snow, but I would also have everything from the rebellion to dream about. "They might get better."

"Maybe," I said, although I greatly doubted that. "Can we go out to the range for a little while?"

"Certainly. I figured that you might want some time to exhaust a little frustration," Seneca said.

That must have been the real reason that he had brought me down here. Otherwise we would have gone to the armory. "You were right. As you normally are," I teased.

With the times changing, Seneca had turned into my new Haymitch. At least Seneca was nice and not a drunk. Seneca merely smiled as I headed over towards the shooting range that Beetee had me use earlier. I was glad to be out here again. I was annoyed and desperately wanted to shoot a few targets. It might make me feel just the slightest bit better, since I was such a terrible actress. To my surprise, Katniss was already standing there.

She was shooting with some of the regular arrows designed for target practice. "Cat," I called. She lowered the bow and placed her arrow back in the sheath. "I thought that you'd be in class or training."

Katniss turned back and gave me a bitter smile. "Heard about the propo," she said.

"Does everyone know about that already?" I groaned.

Katniss shook her head. "No. But Gale and I heard about it. They were telling us that apparently you struggled with it," Katniss said.

"Now that's putting it lightly," I laughed.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'm sure that I would have done even worse than you did."

The image of Katniss trying to say those lines put a smile on my face. "Oh, I know. But it doesn't help that I was terrible. It doesn't matter. We would have ended up here anyways," I muttered.

Katniss's brows furrowed. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"If you had been the one who had gone into the Games. We would have still ended up here, one way or another. I genuinely believe that. I told you, it would have happened the same way," I said, shooting a smile at Seneca. "We always would have wound up here. The two of us are far too similar."

"It's a good thing," Seneca said, smiling.

"Figured you might want some time out on the range," Katniss said, shrugging.

"Oh, yeah. I'm using the explosive ones," I said, grabbing one of Beetee's arrows.

Katniss grinned and pulled one out herself. "Sweet," she chirped.

Seneca was standing back a few steps and watching the two of us with a smile. "You know, I saw Haymitch today," I said for the sake of conversation.

"Did you?" Katniss asked.

Irritably shooting off a plain arrow, I watched as the arrow skewered a dummy through the throat. "I did. For a minute I thought about talking to him. Saying something. Not that I was really sure what I was supposed to say," I said. Then I looked back at Seneca. "I know that you told me that I was supposed to ask him about... whatever it was. But I couldn't bring myself to do it. I'm just so angry with him."

"You've managed to forgive the rest of us," Katniss reasoned.

But it wasn't enough. Haymitch was... he was supposed to always be there for me. He was supposed to be on my side. "None of you really made me a promise. Not ones that I believed, at least," I corrected, when I saw the look on Katniss's face. "But I always believed Haymitch. I thought that he was on my side. His betrayal hurt the worst."

"Remember that he didn't want to do it," Seneca put in.

"I know," I growled, sending another arrow through the dummy's eye. "But I hate that he did."

"Are you going to talk to him?" Katniss asked, skewering a dummy through the heart.

"At some point. Whenever I figure out just what I want to say to him," I said, shooting an arrow into the center of the chest.

"What are you planning on saying to him?" Katniss asked, shooting the same dummy just slightly higher than her first one.

Seneca was watching the two of us, clearly impressed. "Right now, nothing. Right now all I want to do are throw a bunch of curses at him. I can't have a normal conversation with him right now. Not without letting everything out," I admitted.

"You'll have to deal with him tomorrow," Seneca said.

"He's hosting the meeting about my failures, I assume?" I growled.

Seneca smiled, placing a reassuring hand on my shoulder. "It wasn't a failure. Just a misstep," he consoled.

Perhaps that made me feel just the slightest bit better about myself. "Thanks." I noticed that Seneca's gaze was turned towards my hand that was resting on the bow. "Wanna learn to shoot a bow?" I asked.

At my words, both Katniss and Seneca looked at me. Katniss raised a brow as Seneca smiled. "Sure. Might make you feel a little better if you get the chance to make me look like a fool," he said.

To my surprise, all three of us laughed. "Have you never shot one before?" Katniss asked.

"I've never held a weapon before," Seneca admitted.

Katniss laughed under her breath, taking her arrow off of the notch and setting it back on the counter. "Funny, coming from someone who was once Head Gamemaker for a tournament where kids are almost instantly killed if they don't have a weapon," she half-snarled and half-stated.

"Cat... Relax," I chided.

There was no need to be angry with each other anymore. Katniss waved me off. "I know, I know."

Seneca shook his head at me. "It's alright. I deserve it."

"Come on," I said, pulling him up to the counter.

"You can use this one," Katniss said, handing Seneca a bow that was almost identical to the one that she had.

"Is that the spare that I had from the arena?" I asked.

"Yeah. This is the one that Beetee didn't alter," Katniss explained.

It was probably the best that Seneca didn't learn on any of the altered bows. They were heavier and more complicated. Seneca nodded, looking at the bow almost awkwardly. "Okay," he muttered.

"Take it," I prodded.

The moment that he reached his arm out, I could tell that he wanted to take it back. He didn't want to use a weapon. He wasn't a fighter. But he pushed through anyways. So he grabbed the bow out of Katniss's hand and the two of us stepped back. I could tell that he was trying to mimic the way that he had seen us hold our bows so many times. But he was completely wrong on how to hold it. Katniss and I exchanged a glance before we starting laughing. Seneca turned back to us with a little glare.

"What?" Seneca snapped.

"You're holding it completely wrong," I pointed out.

Seneca placed the bow down on the counter again before scowling at me. "Well I've never held one before. How about some help?" he asked the two of us.

Both Katniss and I moved forward, exchanging a small smile with each other. "Okay. Legs positioned around shoulder width apart. Torso, hips, and entire body are turned perpendicular towards your intended target. Seat an arrow on the rest, nock it, and lift the bow," I instructed slowly.

When I had taught Dean, he had clearly understood me. Seneca turned back with a stupefied stare. "What?" he asked dumbly.

"Watch," Katniss goaded.

Standing at Seneca's side, I motioned for him to pay attention to her. Katniss placed the arrow at the notch and knocked it as I motioned Seneca to do the same. As Katniss placed the arrow on the rest, I helped Seneca to do the same. Although Dean clearly had some experience with weapons and hadn't been half-bad with preparations, it was clear that Seneca had no inclination for weapons. I had to rearrange his stance and grip on the arrow and bow three times before I was satisfied.

"Lift up so it's approximately shoulder height," I instructed, watching as Seneca lifted the bow. "Make sure your bow arm is straight and locked at the elbow. Don't clinch the bow with your grip. Let it rest against and push into the inside of your palm as you pull the string."

"Shoulders down," Katniss instructed, glancing over.

Placing a hand on his shoulders, I gently pushed them down into place. A moment later I rolled his arm so that his elbow was perpendicular to the ground. "Don't rotate your arm like that. The string will hit it and that hurts," I instructed.

"I'll say," Katniss muttered.

We had both been hit by the string before. While my scar had been taken away by the Capitol after my first Games, Katniss still had hers. "Only turn your head towards your target; the rest of your body should be perpendicular to the target. Pull the string about half-way through," I instructed.

Seneca pulled the string just a bit. Katniss and I had to pull his grip a little further back. He seemed afraid that the arrow would somehow magically fly off of the string. Katniss and I exchanged another funny look. I had never seen someone quite so afraid of a weapon. Even Prim - who hated everything to do with weaponry - could at least tolerate them. She might have been a healer, but I had seen her manage her way around knives. Although she used them to help heal, not hurt.

"You look so uncomfortable with it," Katniss commented.

"Honestly, I am," Seneca admitted.

"Pull the string all the way, until the string reaches the corner of your mouth. That's your anchor point. Right below the jawline. Don't use the muscles of your arms. Use your back muscles to do the majority of the work. They're significantly stronger," I said.

"Go on," Katniss instructed, when she saw that Seneca wasn't going to move.

I moved forward and pulled the string with him, gently placing it against the corner of his mouth for him. "Aim with your dominant eye. Keep the other one closed. Release the string by letting it slide out from your fingers. Don't jerk it or abruptly release it. Relax the fingers just enough to allow the string to slide out and accelerate the arrow," I continued.

"What happens if you jerk it?" Seneca asked, not moving from his stance.

"The arrow won't fly straight," Katniss explained.

"Remain motionless in position after you release the string until the arrow hits the target. It trains you not to jerk your body as soon as you release the string. Ready?" I asked.

"I suppose," Seneca sighed.

"Go ahead," I said.

Part of me wondered if he was doing this to make me feel a little less like a fool. I was terrible and looked like a fool when it came to public speaking. Seneca was useless and a fool when it came to using weapons. We both stepped back to allow Seneca to make the shot. He followed our orders - messing most of them up as a beginner would - with the normal arrow and slowly released it. I watched happily as it soared ahead of us and just barely clipped the edge of the arm of the target.

Both of us nodded our approval. Seneca looked shocked that he had even managed to hit the target. "Not a bad start," I admitted.

Seneca gently placed down his bow. "Years working for the Hunger Games and watching Tributes fight and die; that's the first time that I've ever picked up a weapon," he said slowly.

"That's the first time you've even picked up a weapon?" Katniss asked disbelievingly.

"Yes," Seneca said.

"Come on. Let's keep working," I interrupted, sensing a fight forming.

My fights with Gale were bad enough. I really didn't want to have to diffuse a fight between Katniss and Seneca. That could have gotten awkward quickly. So instead we all picked up our bows again and started to work with the arrows - only giving Seneca the razor-sharp ones. Katniss and I used the incendiary and explosive ones, laughing each time that we made a perfect shot. But we kept stopping to try and help out Seneca - who wasn't even a fraction as talented as either one of us.

To my surprise, he actually wasn't too bad with the bow and arrow. I would have put him at just a little worse than Glimmer had been - which was impressive, despite the fact that Glimmer wasn't good with them, she had still been a Career. He certainly couldn't hold a candle to either one of us. He likely never would be able to. But both Katniss and I were having a good time laughing at his misfortune. Even he was laughing. He was finally starting to look like he might have becoming a real rebel.

Seneca Crane had certainly come a long way from the Head Gamemaker I had met over a year ago. But I supposed that I was different too, no longer the unknown District 12 girl without parents. Trying to blink back those thoughts, I went back to shooting. I could tell that Seneca was definitely having more fun watching Katniss and I using them. We were both quite good with trick shots and normal ones. Today the two of us were working together, putting on quite the show for Seneca.

He had even made a few jokes about that being the reason that I had gotten a twelve - and letting Katniss know that he would have given her a good score too. "You two always have been fun to watch," Gale's voice suddenly called.

All three of us turned back. "Hey," I greeted.

Gale gave me a small smile before turning to Seneca. Here we go... "You learning or just here to watch?" Gale asked.

Well that was surprisingly civil. "Trying to learn. Two good teachers here," Seneca said, turning back to Katniss and I fondly.

I was more than a little surprised - and definitely happy - that Katniss gave him an almost-smile back. "Yeah, they are." Gale turned to me. "Can we talk?" he asked.

"Sure," I said.

Katniss moved forward and grabbed the bow and sheath of arrows from me. "I'll bring those back. I doubt that anyone wants to see you walking around with that. They don't really trust you," she explained.

"The feeling is mutual," I growled, handing them over.

Seneca smiled and handed Katniss his own weapons. "I have work to be doing anyways. Have a good night, Aspen. I'll see you at the strategy meeting tomorrow," Seneca said.

"Goodnight, Seneca. See you later, Cat," I called.

"Be nice," Katniss hissed, likely about my coming conversation with Gale.

Rolling my eyes, I shoved her off towards the door. I could manage a conversation with Gale for a few minutes. Not that I had offered any proof of that lately. Either way, Seneca and Katniss walked off together. I could tell that Katniss wasn't overly-fond of Seneca, but she was trying to get along with him for my sake. Gale, on the other hand, wouldn't budge. He hated him and likely always would. I turned to Gale curiously. We still hadn't really gotten over our fight from the other day.

"Wanna stay here or go somewhere?" I asked carefully.

"Not like we can go to the woods right now," Gale said, just as guarded.

"That would be nice."

By now I really did miss the woods. It was horrible being cooped up in here with everything thinking that I was either a traitor or a failure. "You're not happy with me about what I said the other day," Gale said, after a brief silence.

Turning to Gale, I nodded at him. He was right about that. I was still angry at Gale, and I would be until he apologized for what he had said to me that day. "I know that you don't mean it. Not the way that it came out. I know that you don't want something bad to happen to me. But, Gale, I need you on my side. Not Coin's," I said seriously.

This wasn't something that I could handle without Gale. I needed him and Katniss. "I'm not on Coin's side," Gale said, placing a hand on my shoulder. I almost smiled. "I'm on the side of the rebellion."

My half-smile immediately dropped. "So not mine?" I asked shortly.

Gale sighed, knowing that he had made another misstep. "I want the Games to end. I want the Capitol's reign to end," Gale said.

"So do I," I added.

"But you also want Cato back," Gale said.

There it was again. Why the hell was Gale being so nasty about Cato? He couldn't have really hated him that much. "You hate him that much that you would condemn him to die in the Capitol?" I snapped.

Instead of getting angry with me again like I had thought that he would, Gale's face fell, realizing what I thought that his words meant. "No. No, that's not what I meant. What I meant was that you're so determined to save him, that you might not always think about what's best for the rebellion. That's what Coin's trying to prevent," Gale explained.

"She's trying to dictate what happens. Just the way that the Capitol does," I snapped.

Gale shook his head. "No, she's not. She holds the reigns tight because she has to," Gale said.

Another fight on its way. Just as always. "This place isn't that different from the Capitol," I growled.

"Yes, it is."

"It isn't!"

"And how do you know?" Gale sneered.

My jaw almost dropped. How stupid could he have possibly been? Thinking that I didn't know about how this place was compared to the Capitol. I had spent almost two months in the Capitol and their arenas over the past year and a half. I knew far more about that place than Gale did. He had set foot there for two days. He had seen the bright and happy, celebratory side. I was the one who had seen the real nightmare that it was. The Games, the arena, and the constant political struggle. I had seen the torture.

Out of the two of us, I was the only one who earned the right to talk about the Capitol. "I've spent quite a bit of time in the Capitol, in case you forgot!" I shouted, my voice echoing off of the walls.

Gale clearly knew that he had hurt me. He tried to backpedal slightly. "But you haven't bothered looking around. Really getting to know Thirteen," Gale said.

That was the last thing that I wanted to do. Get to know Thirteen. "I have no interest in really getting to know Thirteen. I know enough. They didn't come to our aid when we needed it," I snarled.

"They couldn't -"

"Afford it?" I interrupted. "Yeah. So I've heard."

"Aspen -"

"Look, I'm sick of arguing with you," I interrupted again, unwilling to make this any worse than it already was. We had hated each other for long enough. "It seems like that's all that we've done for weeks. For today can we just not argue? I've got what's likely to be a pain in the ass day tomorrow of everyone telling me how useless I am. I don't need a fight to start off my terrible day."

Gale and I stared at each other for a moment. Finally he nodded. "Okay. No more fighting," Gale conceded.

The two of us walked over to the counter where the weapons were at and I watched as Gale ran his hands over the bow that he had picked out. "That was the bow that I was looking at earlier. The one that you picked up," I said, for the sake of conversation.

"It's cool," Gale said absentmindedly.

Another brief silence passed. "You know that's not designed to be used on animals," I finally said.

This time there was a much longer stretch of silence. As tough as Gale was, he had never taken a human life before. "I know," Gale finally said, not giving me an indication of whether to not he was okay with the thought.

"Are you going to be ready to use it?" I asked carefully.

That time there was no hesitation. "Yes and no. I know that I'm ready to end the rebellion and make the new world. Killing those mindless soldiers, the Peacekeepers, doesn't bother me," Gale said.

"They still follow you."

"What does?"

Gale had to know that killing someone didn't just leave you unaffected, even if you didn't care about them or if you hated them. "The people who you kill," I said.

"Not a Peacekeeper," Gale argued.

He had to understand what I meant. "Trust me, Gale. I've killed someone. Multiple someone's. They follow you. Whether or not you cared for them or hated them... The girl from District 9? The first human life that I took. I didn't even know her name. I didn't care about her. But do you have any idea how many times I've seen her in my nightmares? They never leave you," I argued.

No one that I had ever killed had left me. Each of them stayed with me in their own ways. And it wasn't even just them. There was also the problem of the few people that I hadn't killed. The ones who I had seen die in front of me or the ones who I felt guilty for. Glimmer, whom I had hated, whom I hadn't actually killed, still haunted my nightmares. The sight of her mutilated and mangled body from the venom of the Tracker Jackers. The memory of her mother's words to me about her funeral.

Perhaps there was a chance that Gale would never understand the truth behind my words. Not unless he ever got around to taking a life himself. But that was something that I wanted to protect him from. I didn't want him to have to do that. I didn't care how strong he pretended to be. Things like that disturbed everyone. Even Cato had nightmares about the arena. And I was no fool. The war would be just the same as the arena. Knowing the Capitol, it would be worse.

All of those things that came to mind, I so desperately wanted to tell him. I wanted to tell him that infiltrating the Capitol would be like a giant Games. He would see the same things - if not worse - than I saw in my own Games. I wanted to tell him how many nightmares I had about the wolf mutts, how many times I felt the pain of the fire or poison fog, how many times I heard the screams from the Jabberjay's in my nightmares, and how, to this day, I still constantly found myself looking over my shoulders.

But I couldn't force the words out of my mouth, and Gale wouldn't have listened to them anyways. "It doesn't matter. I would kill every breathing soul in the Capitol if I could," Gale said.

As much as I hated them, I recognized something else. "There are innocent women and children there," I argued.

"Who will grow up to be just like the rest of them," Gale continued.

"But they have a chance. Cinna grew up in the Capitol," I reminded him.

Gale never wanted to insult Cinna in front of me, but I knew that he wanted me to see his position on this. "He was one in a million. Take out a million bad ones, maybe lose one good one," Gale said.

"If I didn't know any better, I would think that President Snow said that," I said coldly.

It was the same kind of thing that I had heard President Snow say so often. He was the person who had always said the coldest things. He was the one who had always made me think that he didn't have a heart. Gale, my Gale, was not that kind of person. I loved him and vice versa. He was the one who had taken care of me as a kid, he had helped me hunt, healed me when I was hurt, and had always protected me. I couldn't have ever thought that I could relate Gale to President Snow before this.

"I'm not saying it to be cruel," Gale said, sensing what I was thinking. "I'm just thinking like a soldier."

"Maybe you do deserve to have that communicuff back," I said harshly.

Because he was thinking just like a soldier. The same kind of soldier that the Peacekeepers were. Blind and thoughtless. Ignorant of human life. My words weren't meant as a joke. They were meant to be something rude, seeing as Gale and I had always teased them about being that big-headed. I wanted to tell Gale that he deserved to be another one of those mindless soldiers that Coin collected in Thirteen. But Gale began laughing. I rolled my eyes and moved to stalk off, determined to go to bed early.

It was probably a good idea anyways, seeing as I was exhausted and was likely going to have a long day tomorrow. "Hang on, Aspen," Gale said, running after me and catching my arm. "Come on. It was just funny."

"It's not a joke to me. None of this is a joke to me," I snapped.

Gale put on a face that was clearly supposed to be comforting. "I know. I know." The two of us walked off, me trying to stay a little bit ahead of him. "Where are you going?" Gale asked.

All I wanted to do was walk off and go straight back to the ruins of District 12, alone, so that I could sulk in my own misery and mistakes. "Heading back to the compartment. I was thinking about turning in early for the night. It's gonna be a long day tomorrow talking about my shortcomings," I said irritably.

"The only shortcoming you have is your height," Gale teased.

There it was. Another one of those little moments where I saw just a hint of our old friendship. I turned back to Gale with a scowl and whacked him in the stomach. "You're such an ass," I snarled.

"Got you to smile. It's been a long time since I got you to smile," Gale said.

"I'm sorry about that... before. I don't want to fight with you," I admitted.

"I don't want to fight with you either," Gale said.

The last thing that I wanted was to fight with one of the few people who was still around to listen and help me out. Most of the time, anyways. Gale wrapped an arm over my shoulder and leaned down to press a kiss into my hair. Something that he hadn't done in a while. I smiled slightly as the two of us walked back to my compartment. I was grateful to have him with me, despite our earlier argument. I could hear even more mutters than normal when I walked by.

It was likely people who were probably thinking that I had finally given up on Cato and gone with Gale, but I brushed them off as we walked into my compartment. "Home sweet home," I sighed.

"Maybe one day we'll get to go back to Twelve," Gale said.

We walked over to my bed and I plopped myself down on it. "I don't think you want to see what happened to Twelve. It's not pretty," I mumbled, well-aware that Gale had seen some of it.

"We could rebuild it," Gale suggested. I raised a brow. "You, me, and Katniss. Bring back the rest of the people who we managed to save."

"That's what Seneca suggested," I commented.

"Do you like that idea?"

Going back to the only home that I had ever known. The home that I had managed to destroy with a single arrow. But it was home, nonetheless. "It's the only place that I feel like could ever really be home," I admitted.

"Even over District 2?" Gale asked.

My gaze shot over to Gale, who was wandering about the room. "What's that supposed to mean?" I asked snappily.

"I was being serious," Gale said softly, knowing that I had taken it the wrong way.

"So was I. District 2 doesn't mean anything to me." Gale gave me a very surprised look. "I've barely even spent any time in it. There are some people from District 2 who I love, but I don't want to live there. I've got no reason to want to live there. And I don't really want to live in the place where Leah was killed. I doubt Cato would either," I reasoned.

"You're planning on settling down somewhere with him after this?" Gale asked.

Of course we were back to that. Just as we always were. "I'm planning on trying to rebuild the world when this is over. My relationship status isn't going to be the first thing on my mind," I snapped harshly.

Just the way that it had annoyed me that Coin had insinuated that my relationship status was the first thing on my mind rather than the rebellion, it annoyed me that Gale thought that living with Cato would be the first thing on my mind after the world. It would definitely be near the top of the list, but it wouldn't be first. I would be more concerned about what was happening with the world as it tried to rebuild itself from scratch.

Gale gave me a very guilty look. "That didn't come out the way that I meant for it to," Gale muttered.

"Obviously," I growled. But a moment later I realized that I shouldn't have said it like that. "Sorry, sorry."

"It's okay." The two of us stared at each other for a moment. "Maybe I should just go," Gale said.

"No!" I cried quickly. Gale turned back, obviously surprised that I had snapped that fast. "No. Stay for a little while, yeah?"

"You really want me to?"

"Yes. We can't keep being angry at each other forever. Stay with me for a little while. Like when we were kids."

There was no use in constantly fighting. We didn't have many people on our side. We needed each other right now, more than ever. "If I recall correctly, when we were kids you used to take up the entire bed. You kicked me out of my own bed a few times because you were rolling around," Gale teased.

"You were on my side," I argued.

"It was my bed!" Gale barked.

We both laughed as he finally crawled into bed with me. I could remember that day perfectly well. Gale had always complained that I was the biggest bed hog. Which I was. I remembered flailing around with nightmares - and simply from being a restless sleeper - and accidentally kicking Gale out of the bed. When I woke up in the morning, he was sleeping on the floor. When I had asked what had happened, he had merely told me that he didn't want to wake me up. Gale had always been a wonderful man.

In fact, Cato had even said the same thing. Apparently I did roll around in my sleep a lot. But they had rarely been from nightmares. I didn't have nearly as many nightmares when I was with him. Mostly because he made me feel just the slightest bit safer. Just as Gale did. But I could remember waking up a few mornings with Cato and spotting bruises on him. He had told me that it was fine, I just kicked a lot in my sleep. But he hadn't minded, just the way that Gale didn't.

Two wonderful men, each with their own reasons for me to love them. Make up your damn mind. You love Cato. Tell Gale. I couldn't. Not with the fear that he wouldn't love me anymore. Weakling. Gale pulled himself next to me and threw the sheets up around us a moment later. I yanked myself up to his chest and laid my head in the crook of his shoulder and arm. Just the way that I did with Cato. I was sure that there wasn't anything romantic between the two of us, but I was comfortable being here.

Somewhere at Gale's side had always been a place of comfort for me. He was strong and comforting. He always had been. But it didn't stop me from feeling the slightest bit guilty for being here with Gale while Cato was... doing what? Having what happen to him? I couldn't be sure, but I was positive that it was nothing good. Not with the Capitol. But I tried not to think about that. I would have him back soon enough and he would officially join the rebellion. In the meantime, I had to hang onto my sanity.

For a while, Gale and I laid together and chatted back and forth quietly. I wasn't sure where the rest of my family was, but they must have been busy doing something, as they never returned. I was actually impressed that the two of us managed to make it an entire hour without getting into a fight, which we seemed to be doing so much recently. Eventually my eyes started to droop shut and I finally managed to fall asleep. Before I did, I noticed that Gale was running his hands gently through my hair, just as Cato did.

When I managed to open my eyes again, I was still lying in bed. But it felt strange. Like it was the middle of the night. It was hard to tell with only a tiny window that was mostly covered. I slowly peeled my eyes open and glanced over, curious as to what time it was and what had happened. But I was immediately met with bare skin. I was sleeping on Cato's chest. He was already awake, his fingers slowly tracing patterns into my bare shoulders. He finally noticed that I was awake and smiled down at me.

"Morning. Morning? Afternoon?" I asked dumbly, unsure of what time it was.

"I'm not sure. I don't think it really matters," Cato said.

Something felt a tiny bit off-putting. Like something was bound to go wrong. Like we were missing something. "We should get up," I said, not bothering to move and get up.

"Are you ready to get up?" Cato asked teasingly.

"No. I'd much rather lay in bed for the rest of the day," I said.

"Let's do that," Cato whispered.

So we would. We never got to do that. With the exception of the day up on the roof before the Quell, this was the only time that we had ever gotten to just lay around lazily. I smiled softly as Cato reached up and wrapped a hand in my slightly-tangled hair. I giggled under my breath as Cato's spare arm wrapped around my waist and he pulled me up against his chest. It was wonderful to just be able to touch him. Be with him. It felt like it had been so long. As I moved slightly, the sheet moved down from my back.

"That's a sight I like to see," Cato teased, looking over my shoulder.

"You can always see more. Just ask," I shot back.

"Can I see more?" Cato asked.

"No," I said shortly.

We both laughed. "You're such a brat."

"Yes, I am. But I'm your brat."

"And I wouldn't have it any other way."

Pressing a kiss down into Cato's chest, I sighed and ran a finger over him. "I've missed you," I whispered.

"I'm right here. I'll always be right here," Cato said, pressing a kiss into my hair.

We laid in silence for another brief moment. Cato's hands gently ran over my body, making goosebumps rise on my skin. "Where do you want to live?" I finally asked, breaking the silence. Cato hummed questioningly at me. "When this is all over. When we're done with the rebellion and the dust settles, I assume that we're going to live together."

For a moment I felt stupid. Maybe he didn't want to live together. "Yes, married couples tend to do that," Cato teased.

At least I didn't have that to worry about. "Where do you want to settle down?" I repeated.

Cato sat in silence for a while. "What about if we rebuilt District 12?" he finally offered.

"Just the two of us?"

It would have taken years. We might have never been able to finish it. "I'll spend the rest of my life doing it, if that's what you want to do," Cato said.

"You're too good for me," I muttered.

"You used to think that it was the other way around," Cato pointed out.

He was completely right. Once upon a time I had thought that I was the better person. I had been sure of it. Cato had just been a cruel Career. I had hated him and believed that he had only wanted to kill everyone in sight. Including me. But he had hesitated. He had taken Ethan when he had offered a skill. He had tried to save me repeatedly. What had I done? Killed everyone at first sight. Thought about killing my friend, Finnick. Cato had stepped in to stop me. He was - and always would be - the better one.

"You're right about that. I used to think that I was the better one. Kinder, happier, a sense of right and wrong. I've discovered lately that I was wrong. You're the better one. You always were. I just tried to deny it," I admitted.

Cato frowned and shook his head. "That's not the truth. You always have been and always will be the better half," Cato said.

"Everything that I've done... I had to have broken your heart at least once," I muttered.

It was a truth that I didn't like to admit. But it was the truth. I had to have broken his heart. Telling him that he was exactly what I had expected. Dropping those Tracker Jackers. Kissing Gale and being unable to stop it. Still - despite everything - having some unrequited feelings for Gale. How could I have done that? Cato didn't know for a fact, but he must have suspected something was there between us. When he had been in the Capitol... Had I broken his heart, thinking that I had abandoned him?

Cato finally nodded. "Yes. I've never felt a strain on my heart as much as I did when I was around you." My heart fell. "But it was all worth it. I would take all of the heartache in the world just to get to live my life with you," he whispered.

A few minutes passed that I just stared at Cato. It was times like this that I couldn't believe who he was. I couldn't believe that he was the same vile Career I had once met. There had always been a world of differences between the two of us. We had always been like two opposite poles in nature and temperament. And yet, we were perfect for each other. We belonged together. I knew that. We made each other complete in a way that nobody else could. We were contentment in our false, paradisiacal, place.

Disaster would always rage around us, but when it was just the two of us, we would always be able to tune everything else out. "Do you think we'll be happy when this is all over?" I finally asked.

"I'm already happy," Cato said.

"With all of this?" I asked, motioning around us.

This was definitely not a happy time. It was one of the unhappiest times that I had ever been through. "Yes. It doesn't matter what happens here or on the war front. The only thing that matters is that I'm with you. I'm happy when I'm with you. Always have been. Always will be," Cato muttered, his fingers digging slightly at the skin on my back.

"You're too good for me."

"Maybe, but I don't want anyone else."

"Me either."

"You're sure?"

My heart dropped into my stomach. Did he really know about Gale? And, for some strange reason, even Seneca's face briefly flashed through my mind. "What?" I asked blankly.

Cato grinned teasingly at me and I realized that it had just been a joke. "You seem to be pretty desirable." He was right about that. I had seen enough men that wanted to see far too much of me. "You're sure that there's no one else you'd rather be with?" Cato asked playfully.

For once, there was no doubt in my mind. "Positive. You're the only one that I want," I said determinedly.

Cato smiled. "Good. Go to sleep. I've got you. Always," he whispered.

Smiling slightly, I pressed a small kiss against his chest and laid down again. I loved him so much that it was painful. Sometimes I even forgot about how much I loved him. After a few moments of resting on him, I could feel myself starting to doze off again. It was a long and stressful day. But I would always feel better as long as he was with me. His fingers were slowly running through my hair and his lips against my temple. His fingers, gently splayed across my back, quickly put me to sleep.

When I woke up again, I instantly sat up to see where Cato was. But he wasn't there anymore. He was gone. Immediately I felt that horrible pang of loss again. Just the way that I had in the Quarter Quell - after we had spent that night together, when I had woken up, he was on the other side of the beach. A happiness that was associated with Cato that was taken away the moment that I realized what reality actually was. For just those brief moments, I had really thought that he was here.

Just as I should have known, Cato wasn't here. He was still captured in the Capitol. Coin hadn't arranged the rescue mission. I still feared for his life in the Capitol. What if they killed him? Could my heart take any more breaking? I had already given him my heart a long time ago. If he died, would he manage to take it with him? Would I spend the rest of forever with a hole inside of me that couldn't be filled? I could love him as much as I wanted to... But I could never love someone as much as I could miss them.

That was the lesson that I had learned with Cato gone. He was gone, and I missed him more than I had ever thought that I could love him. If I got him back, I would have to remember that. I would have to love him more than I had ever thought was possible. I let out a soft breath and fully woke up. I glanced around the room to see that the sun was slightly streaming into the room and everyone was here. Katniss and Ms. Everdeen were still asleep. But Prim was walking out of the bathroom.

She noticed that I was awake and grabbed my hairbrush off of the counter, tossing it to me. "Good morning," Prim said softly, seating herself on the edge of my bed.

"Morning. Thanks for that," I said, running the brush through my hair.

"You're welcome," Prim said.

Glancing around the room, I realized that there was one person missing. "Where's Gale?" I asked Prim.

Had he left in the middle of the night? I knew that I hadn't asked him to leave. "He was sleeping in the bed with you when we came in. He got up and promised that he would see you in the morning. We offered him to stay but he said that he didn't want to intrude," Prim explained.

"Oh... He should know that he's never intruding," I muttered.

"That's what we said." Prim obviously noticed that someone was wrong as I curled into myself on the bed. "Are you okay?" Prim finally asked, sitting pressed up against me.

"Yeah."

Keeping my problems to myself again. "Mockingjay duties didn't go well yesterday?" Prim asked.

"That obvious?"

"You never were very good in front of the camera."

Her blunt answer made me snort. She was right, but she was so different from the Prim that I had saved from the Reaping a year and a half ago. It reminded me that she had grown up in that time. She had been forced to grow up. Despite the fact that I had saved her, she had learned that it was time for her to grow up. Not necessarily to be a fighter, but to be strong in her own way. From time to time I realized that she was even stronger than I was.

"Thanks," I said blandly.

"I'm sorry," Prim said quickly.

It took me a moment to realize that I shouldn't have said it that way. "It's okay. You're right," I said, placing a hand on her shoulder. "I was useless out there. It was completely pathetic. I couldn't say the lines correctly and I couldn't manage to make myself look good for even just a second. I failed."

"It's just one day. It's the first day. There might be a learning curve. Give it a few weeks," Prim said.

Was she really only thirteen? She seemed thirty half of the time. "Thanks, sweetie. I'm hoping that it gets easier. I just can't... recite lines. It doesn't come to me," I complained.

Prim thought about it for a moment. "Maybe ask if you can write your lines," she suggested.

There was something that I would have never thought of. "That's not a bad idea. I just hate the idea that someone's out there fighting and dying for something that I started and I'm here, being treated well, taken care of, and constantly being pampered. It makes me feel like a fraud. I would rather be out there where the real fighting is," I said.

"You can't go out there?"

"No. Coin thinks it's too dangerous and puts me at too much of a risk."

"She's not wrong about that. Every gun that Capitol has would be trained on you within seconds." My head whipped around to Prim quickly. "Sorry," she muttered.

Shaking my head at her, I laid a hand on her knee. "No. You're right," I said.

Prim and I sat in silence for a moment. "Something else has you bothered," Prim reasoned.

"You heard what Coin said about my Mockingjay duties. If I failed in them or deviated... I know that this wasn't on purpose - I just can't act. She should know that. But there's a problem. Honestly I'm nervous that my shortcomings being the Mockingjay are going to make Coin go back on her word to save Cato," I said, stumbling over my words stupidly.

No matter what they did to me, I would never be an actor. "She won't do that," Prim said. I raised a brow confusedly. "She doesn't have the reason to do it. One bad acting job isn't good enough to condemn you or Cato."

"I just wish he was here. Things would be so much easier. I wouldn't be so worried about my every move," I mumbled.

"Don't get nervous. Just keep doing whatever it is that Coin wants you to do. That'll help," Prim said.

"That's true."

"Don't panic and don't say anything out of line to her."

Smiling at the girl who was my younger sister, no matter that we weren't actually related, I shook my head. "You would have been a much better Mockingjay," I admitted.

Prim gave me another small smile. "I doubt that," she said.

"I don't."

We both smiled at each other. A moment later I heard stirring on the other end of the room. Katniss and Ms. Everdeen were peeling themselves out of bed. "Morning," Katniss said, glancing over at us.

"Hey, Cat," I said.

"Good morning, girls," Ms. Everdeen said.

"Morning," we all chirped.

Stall for just a little while longer. I really didn't want to have to listen to my shortcomings. "You ready to go?" Katniss finally asked, shattering the somewhat-tense silence.

"See how pathetic I am?" I offered. The other three smiled bitterly. "Yeah. Let's do it. We'll see you two later."

"Good luck," Prim said.

"I'm sure it wasn't that bad," Ms. Everdeen consoled.

In the back of my mind, I knew that they both knew just how terrible it had been. But they weren't going to say anything about it. Not when they knew how upset I was about everything. They knew that I was hurting over just how stupid I had been. Just how terribly I had failed. So Katniss and I walked out to have breakfast before the meeting. It was written second on my schedule for the day. The rest was clear. They must have been planning on having a long talk about how useless I was.

As for now, I was starving and slightly panicked. Starving because I really hadn't eaten much yesterday and I had gone to bed without dinner. Panicked because I was about to find out what Coin thought about her Mockingjay's first performance. It took a little while, but Gale and the others eventually joined us. Cato's family and his friends were over at their table. They were all smiling at me and giving me reassuring looks, but I merely shook my head and looked away. I had failed them, too.

Right after I was done eating, I was taken by Flavius, Venia, and Octavia to redo some of the process from yesterday. The makeup was still on me from the night before, but I would have to have the braid redone and put the Mockingjay costume back on. They very quickly worked my hair into the same braid that it had been in and helped me slip the Mockingjay costume back into place. The only thing that they didn't give me was the actual weapon. That was probably a better idea.

Once they had finished redoing my look and having me appear back as their Mockingjay, I was walked back towards the War Room. On the way there, Effie and Seneca met up with us. Even Brutus was there. To my surprise, they all stayed silent. They must have known just how terrible this was going to be. As we walked in, I dropped into a chair at the corner of the large table and felt my face heat up. Instead of being embarrassed about yesterday, now I was angry again.

Instantly I was chastised by Plutarch for my reaction yesterday. But I tuned him out during the first half of the conversation. The shock of hearing Haymitch's voice yesterday, of learning that he was not only functional but had some measure of control over my life again, enraged me. I had deserved to leave the studio directly and refuse to acknowledge his comments from the booth today. Anyone else's I could take. Just not his. Even so, I knew immediately that he was right about my performance.

It ended up taking the whole of the morning for him to convince the others of my limitations. That I couldn't pull it off. I couldn't stand in a television studio wearing a costume and makeup in a cloud of fake smoke and rally the Districts to victory. Even with the amazing Prep Team or good lines, I couldn't have done it. It was amazing, really, how long I had survived the cameras. The credit for that, of course, went almost completely to Cato. Alone, I couldn't be the Mockingjay.

That was much of Haymitch's initial argument towards my lack of ability to not be the Mockingjay. At least, this version of the Mockingjay. Haymitch consistently argued that it was Cato who had ever made me so wonderful during the Games. He had been the one that had made me so desirable. As much as I hated Haymitch, he was right. From that first kiss at Snow's party two days before the Games to the way that he spoke about me in the Interviews to his constant visits during the Games.

Anything that I had said or done had been based off of something that Cato had said or done. That was Haymitch's next argument. Once more, he was right. Cato was the one that had managed to speak so highly about me during his return to District 2 after the Games and during the Victory Tour. I was the moron who could barely get more than five words out at a time and get people killed for my own stupid - but stirring - words. Cato was the one with the sweet words and actions during the Quarter Quell.

The pregnancy ruse that had sparked accusations of cruelty even in the Capitol had been all because of Cato. It was all because of him. He was the one who had fought to protect me so hard during the Quell. Sometimes even harder than I had fought to protect him, despite my initial motivations. He was the one who had inspired me to act so harshly. I was always the one who made the stupid and brash moves while he was able to turn them around and make me look like I was simply strong-willed.

Everyone listened as we gathered around the huge table in Command. Coin and her people. Plutarch, Fulvia, Effie, and my Prep Team. A group from Twelve that included Haymitch and Gale, but also a few others I couldn't explain, like Leevy and Greasy Sae. All of Cato's family were there, as were Marcus and Felix. At the last minute, Finnick wheeled Beetee in, accompanied by Dalton, the cattle expert from Ten. I supposed that Coin had assembled this strange assortment of people as witnesses to my failure.

However, it was Haymitch who welcomed everyone, and by his words I understood that they had come at his personal invitation. This was the first time that we had been in a room together - sitting so close - since I clawed him. I avoided looking at him directly, but I caught a glimpse of his reflection in one of the shiny control consoles along the wall. He looked slightly yellow and had lost a lot of weight, giving him a shrunken appearance. For a second, I was afraid he was dying. I had to remind myself that I didn't care.

It was very tough. For so long, Haymitch had been my friend and confidant. Seneca wanted me to talk to him, but I couldn't. Not now. Not with how furious I was. Brutus sat on the other side of Haymitch, for once looking serious. The marks from when I had clawed Haymitch were still there. I couldn't help but to be a little happy to see that. I hoped that they were a constant reminder that I hated him and that he had failed me. I never wanted him to get over what he had done to me.

Once Haymitch had finished his opening comments, he showed the footage that we had just shot. I seemed to have reached some new low under Plutarch and Fulvia's guidance. Both my voice and body had a jerky, disjointed quality, like a puppet being manipulated by unseen forces. The actual video was impressive. The cheering crowd, burning ruins, flowing Mockingjay flag, and hovercrafts flying over my head. But I was focused on my performance, which was ten kinds of terrible.

"All right," Haymitch said when it was over. I slunk down into my chair, my face burning with embarrassment. Seneca placed a reassuring hand on my knee. "Would anyone like to argue that this is of use to us in winning the war?" No one did. "That saves time. So, let's all be quiet for a minute. Uh... Madam President, indulge me for a moment, if you would." Coin nodded her consent. "I want everyone to think of one incident where Aspen Antaeus genuinely moved you."

"What's he doing?" I whispered to Seneca.

"Quiet," Seneca warned as Haymitch sent me a scowl that I ignored.

"Not where you were jealous of her hairstyle, or her dress went up in flames or she made a halfway decent shot with an arrow or tossed a knife impressively. Not where Cato was making you like her. I want to hear one moment where she made you feel something real," Haymitch continued.

Literally never. I'm useless. Quiet stretched out and I was beginning to think that it would never end, when Leevy spoke up. "When she volunteered to take Prim's place at the Reaping. Because I'm sure she thought she was going to die."

That was actually a good moment. It had been a moment of sheer panic in my mind. A moment when I had refused to let her die, no matter what was going to happen to me. Bet you didn't think this would happen, idiot. Haymitch actually looked reasonably impressed. A moment later he pushed the chair out and got to his feet. He turned and headed over to the screen that had just shown my abysmal performance. He waved his hand over the screen and cleared some type of writing off of it.

"I hope that wasn't important," Haymitch said, almost teasingly. Coin scowled but stayed silent. "Uh... okay." He took out a pen and started to write on the screen. "Good. Excellent example. Volunteered for best friend's sister at Reaping." Haymitch looked around the table. "Somebody else."

This time an answer came much faster. "When she pushed me back in line and wouldn't let me volunteer. She felt that her family was already destroyed. She couldn't let the same thing happen to mine," Katniss said softly.

Haymitch nodded again. "That's right. One of your only good speeches," Haymitch said, not looking at me. I scowled again. "Go on."

I was very surprised that the next speaker was Boggs, who I thought of as a muscular robot that did Coin's bidding. "When she sang the song. While the little girl died."

My stomach jolted painfully. Seneca handed me a small cup of water and I downed it, hiding my face. I never liked people looking at me when they mentioned Rue. She was and always would be a sore spot. Somewhere in my head an image surfaced of Boggs with a young boy perched up on his hip. In the dining hall, I thought. Maybe he wasn't a robot after all. He had a child. I might not have been a mother, but we could both understand protecting a child like they were your own.

"Who didn't get choked up at that, right?" Haymitch said rhetorically, writing it down. Once he was done, Haymitch looked over at Effie, almost as if noticing her for the first time. "You know, I like you better, Effie, without all that makeup."

"Well, I like you better sober," Effie shot back, almost surprising me.

"I cried when she stayed awake all night and kissed Cato on the thigh before the feast!" Octavia blurted out.

Then she covered her mouth, like she was sure that was a bad mistake. But Haymitch only nodded. "Oh, yeah. Manipulated Cato to try and help save his life. Very nice," Haymitch said, a somewhat teasing note in his voice.

The moments began to come thick and fast and in no particular order. When I took Rue on as an ally. Extended my hand to Chaff on Interview night. Tried to carry Mags away from the poison fog. Shoved Cato ahead of me. Forced Finnick away during the fire. Tried to save the man from District Five from the Beast. Begged Cato not to leave me alone at the end of the first Games. Telling Cato that he wasn't what I had expected. Spoke to the little boy Gale on the platform.

Pulling Cato away from the knife of the girl from District 3 in the first Games. Stepped in when Gale was getting whipped. My words for Rue and Thresh during the Victory Tour. Cried during the Reaping for the Quell. My words to Cato at the Cornucopia before the Career attack in the Quell. My impromptu words to Cato at our wedding. Again and again when I held out the daggers that meant different things to different people. Love for Cato. Refusal to give in under impossible odds. Defiance of the Capitol's inhumanity.

Haymitch tapped against the screen. "So, the question is, what do all of these have in common?"

"They were Aspen's. No one told her what to do or say," Gale said quietly.

"Unscripted, yes!" Beetee chirped. He reached over and patted my hand. "So we should just leave you alone, right?"

People laughed. I even smiled a little. That much I hadn't been expecting. But Beetee had been one of the people that hadn't constantly been insulting me. He was one of the few people that just felt that I hadn't found my niche yet. But I understood what he meant. He was trying to tell them that we couldn't put me up on stage saying scripted words. They would have to come from me. We had to do something that would make me give a real reaction. Of course, that could be dangerous and hard to find.

"Well, that's all very nice but not very helpful," Fulvia said peevishly. "Unfortunately, her opportunities for being wonderful are rather limited here in Thirteen."

That's nice. "Fulvia is right. The opportunities for spontaneity are obviously lacking below ground. So what you're suggesting is we toss her into combat?" Plutarch asked.

"I can't sanction putting an untrained civilian in battle just for effect. This is not the Capitol," Coin said.

"That is exactly what I'm suggesting. Put her in the field," Haymitch said.

"No, we can't protect her," Coin argued.

Putting me into battle... That was exactly what I wanted. "I don't need protection," I said determinedly.

Of course, they just ignored me. "Quiet. Let them fight it out," Seneca told me.

Despite this being my life, I knew that they were going to argue without taking into consideration what I wanted. "It has to come from her. That's what people respond to. You want a symbol for the revolution, she cannot be coached into it. Trust me, I know," Haymitch said.

"Thanks," I growled.

Seneca stomped roughly on my foot and I groaned, leaning over. "So basically unless you're suggesting we toss her into the middle of combat -" Fulvia started.

"Like I said, that's exactly what I'm suggesting," Haymitch repeated, sounding even more frustrated this time. "Put her out in the field and just keep the cameras rolling."

"But people think she's pregnant," Gale pointed out.

"We'll do just like we did here in Thirteen. We'll spread the word that she lost the baby from the electrical shock in the arena. Very sad. Very unfortunate," Plutarch offered.

Of course. I remembered when I first got to Thirteen. People used to pass by the hospital wing just to stare at me like an animal on display. They would often times look at my stomach. To see if it was swollen, maybe. To see if they could actually see any evidence of a miscarriage. Thankfully the doctors finally had put me in seclusion and no one had ever said a word about it afterwards. Any time that the pregnancy was mentioned now was during War Room discussions, which was fine by me.

But now they were planning on using it again. To manipulate emotions and to make sense of putting me out in the battlefield. The idea of sending me into combat was definitely controversial. There was a very long argument about it, which, of course, I still wasn't a part of. But Haymitch had a pretty tight case. There was no reason not to put me in the field, especially if I couldn't do anything here. If I performed well only in real-life circumstances, then into them I should go.

"Every time we coach her or give her lines, the best we can hope for is okay. It has to come from her. That's what people are responding to," Haymitch argued.

"Even if we're careful, we can't guarantee her safety," Boggs argued. "She'll be a target for every -"

"I want to go. I'm no help to the rebels here," I broke in.

"And if you're killed?" Coin asked.

There was a brief silence. "Make sure you get it on camera. You can use that, anyway," I answered.

My eyes were firmly locked on Coin's. I had a feeling that she wasn't sure whether or not I was joking. I was, on hundred percent, not joking. Plutarch chuckled, knowing that I meant exactly what I had said. The rest of the people in the room eventually smiled at me. They all knew that me being out in the front lines was the only way that I could really be the Mockingjay. Not with words. With actions. I wanted to do something more, be closer to the Capitol or in it, but right now I would just have to deal with this.

"Fine," Coin finally conceded. "But let's take it one step at a time. Find the least dangerous situation that can evoke some spontaneity in you."

Least dangerous. That was likely to be one of the outlying Districts. Not that I really knew what was dangerous and what wasn't. I merely watched as she stood from her chair. My gaze turned to the maps and screens that were showing the progress of the war. I couldn't make heads or tails of them, but obviously Coin could. She walked all around Command, studying the illuminated District maps that showed the ongoing troop positions in the war.

"Take her into Eight this afternoon," Coin finally said. Eight... I could work with Eight. "There was heavy bombing this morning, but the raid seems to have run its course. I want her armed with a squad of bodyguards. Camera crew on the ground. Haymitch, you'll be airborne and in contact with her. Let's see what happens there. Does anyone have any other comments?"

"Wash her face," Dalton said immediately. Everyone - including me - turned to him. "She's still a girl and you made her look thirty-five. Feels wrong. Like something the Capitol would do."

Nodding my thanks at him, he nodded back. I had a feeling that he didn't like me too much - which was no shock - but I did appreciate what he had said. I would feel like a fool going into District 8, looking like this. As Coin adjourned the meeting, telling everyone to prepare for the mission, Haymitch asked her if he could speak to me privately. Cato's family smiled at me as they left. Seneca gave me a slow nod. The others left except for Gale and Katniss, who lingered uncertainly by my side.

But I couldn't speak to him. Not right now. "I have nothing to say to you, Haymitch," I growled.

"Should we -?" Gale started.

"It's okay," I told Gale and Katniss, and they went.

For a moment I had thought that I might be able to speak with Haymitch. For a moment I thought that I might have been able to say something to him. Confront him. But I couldn't. I didn't want to speak to Haymitch. I just wanted to get ready for the mission to Eight. So I jumped up and made to leave the room. Haymitch instantly followed as we left Command. Besides our thundering footsteps, there was just the hum of the instruments and the purr of the ventilation system. I stomped right down the stairs.

"Aspen -"

"You made your point, Haymitch," I snapped, remembering his laughter and cruel words from yesterday.

But he didn't give up easily. He never had. We hit the landing, Haymitch just behind me, and I kept walking. "Not to you, I didn't," Haymitch snapped. He grabbed my arm and pulled me back to look at him. I merely scowled at him, the two of us standing off in a silent battle. "So, go ahead. Just say it."

"Say what?" I hissed.

"We're gonna have to work together. So you might as well get this off your chest," Haymitch goaded.

I thought of the snarling, cruel exchange back on the hovercraft. The bitterness that followed. But all I said was, "You promised me you would save Cato."

"I know," he replied.

There was a sense of incompleteness. And not because he hadn't apologized. I really wanted one. Actually, more than anything else, I wanted him to admit what he had done. But most of all, it was because we were a team. Inside and outside of the arena. Once upon a time, we had almost been family. We had a deal to keep Cato safe. A drunken, unrealistic deal made in the dark of night, but a deal just the same. And in my heart of hearts, I knew that we both had failed. Not just him.

"Now you say it," I told him.

"I can't believe you let him out of your sight that night," Haymitch said.

In the back of my mind, I knew that he would say it, but that didn't make it hurt any less. "No. No. You don't get to blame this one on me!" I snarled. I tried to sound harsh, but my voice cracked and tears rose to my eyes. "I have been blamed for everything that has happened over the past year and a half. You don't get to blame me for this. You were right there! You caved on it! You let me leave him, knowing what was about to happen."

"I know," Haymitch admitted.

"If one damn person had told me what was happening, if one person had told me what was going on, I would have never let him leave my sight. But you didn't. And we landed ourselves in this mess," I continued.

"I thought that it might be okay," Haymitch said, some guilt seeping into his words.

"You clearly didn't think at all! Haymitch, if you had told me the truth, I wouldn't have done it. I wouldn't have let him go. We would have been together. I would have pressed the button that Seneca had given me. We could have been brought here together. And maybe I wouldn't be having such a hard time stepping into the role that you designated for me," I said, clearly blaming him.

"It was too -"

"Don't tell me that it was too dangerous!" I interrupted, my voice bouncing off of the steel walls. "You lied to me. Just admit that you lied to me."

There was a long stretch of silence between the two of us where we just stared at each other. I said nothing and he said nothing. We just stared. I didn't want to say anything to him. The ball was in his court. It was his job to say something now. It was his job to admit that he had made a mistake. That he had never intended to save Cato. I just wanted to hear him say it. I needed to hear it. My chest was rising and falling quickly as my hands started to shake.

"I lied to you," Haymitch finally said.

"Thank you. For finally saying it," I whispered, trying so desperately to keep my voice from cracking.

Haymitch looked extremely guilty. But I knew that he wouldn't say that he was sorry. "But I would have done it a thousand times over to make sure that we ended up here," Haymitch admitted.

Of course he would have. I nodded slowly. That was it. "I play it over and over in my head. What I could have done to keep him by my side without breaking the alliance. But nothing comes to me," I said.

"I saw it when we were there. You didn't have a choice. And even if I could've made Plutarch stay and rescue him that night, the whole hovercraft would've gone down. We barely got out as it was," Haymitch said.

He didn't even think to save Cato. He didn't even think to go back and at least try and keep his words to me. He hadn't dared to try and keep his promise to me. There was never any intention to save Cato. Not even me. Just the Mockingjay. The thought only made my blood boil in my chest. Furious and heartbroken all at once, I finally met Haymitch's eyes. Seam eyes. Gray and deep and ringed with the circles of sleepless nights. We both had misty eyes, but neither one of us mentioned it.

"I didn't want to get out. I wanted him to get out," I said, my voice shaking.

"You think that I was planning on letting you die?" Haymitch asked harshly.

"I asked you to!" I shouted; a tear fell that was immediately wiped away.

Haymitch moved forward, making a pained face when I instantly took a step back. "I made your mother a promise eighteen years ago. I made her a promise that I would protect you," Haymitch said.

"A damn fine job you've done of that," I snarled.

"You're still alive, aren't you?" Haymitch hissed, readopting his normal attitude.

"Surviving," I corrected.

There was another brief stare-down. We both had managed to calm down, but neither one of us were happy. "Now you've got to stop moping around. You think I want to be here? I want a bottle so bad I'm ready to distill my own turnips. But I'm here, and you know why?" Haymitch asked harshly, but not unkindly.

In the back of my mind, I already knew why. I knew exactly what he had meant. I knew that it was because there was still something that we could do about this. There was something that I could do about this. It all started with me trying to buck up and get my act together. I hated that he was right. Haymitch had always known what to say to me. He had always known what to say to get me up and start acting the way that I should. He was never nice about it, but that was what I needed.

"Because Cato's still alive. He's not dead yet, and neither are we," Haymitch said.

He was right. I still had something to fight for. Haymitch moved forward and laid a hand on my shoulder. This time I didn't back away. "We're still in the game," I said.

I tried to say it with optimism, but my voice cracked. "Still in. And I'm still your Mentor." Haymitch pointed his marker at me. "When you're on the ground, remember I'm airborne. I'll have the better view, so do what I tell you," Haymitch said.

"We'll see," I answered.

"Aspen," Haymitch warned.

"Okay. Okay." Anything to get him to stop complaining at me. I was about to turn and leave to prepare for the mission when I remembered my conversation with Seneca. "Seneca said that there was something I should ask you," I said slowly.

Determined to know what this was all about, I watched Haymitch's reactions to my words very closely. He gave the exact reaction that I was fearing. One that told me that this was another very large secret that he was harboring from me. His face paled even more than it ever had. If possible, he looked even worse than he did when I had first seen him. Clearly what he was hiding from me wasn't something good. Haymitch also looked a little annoyed. He merely stared at me for a moment before shaking his head.

"One step at a time, alright?" Haymitch offered.

Whatever this secret was, it would put us back to square one. So I nodded, knowing that we had made some progress. "Okay," I conceded.

The two of us stared at each other before I turned and walked off, without bothering to say goodbye. I returned to the Remake Room silently and watched the streaks of makeup disappear down the drain as I scrubbed my face clean. The only thing that I was thinking about was the secret that Haymitch was hiding from me. The secret that obviously a few people knew. It must have been about me, but no one was actually going to tell me. Likely because it would upset me.

As much as I wanted to think about it, I knew that I had to think about the mission to District 8. That was what mattered right now. Not another secret that was destined to only upset me. Once the water started running clear again, I glanced up at myself. The person in the mirror looked ragged, with her slightly uneven skin and tired eyes, but she looked a lot more like me. I ripped the armband off, revealing the ugly scar from the tracker. There. That looked like me, too.

There were numerous kinds of armor that Cinna had designed. Some were just tactical that would help me carry supplies and weapons. Others were made only for the camera. They would look impressive but weren't designed to take any real hits. That was the armor that I was in yesterday. The chest plate was hard enough to stop a bullet, but it would still hurt like hell if I was actually hit. The armor today was clearly what had been meant to be worn into a real war.

Since I was going to be in a combat zone, Beetee helped me into the armor that Cinna designed. A helmet of some interwoven metal that fit close to my head. The material was supple, like fabric, and could be drawn back like a hood in case I didn't want it up full-time. I kept it down to pull my braid out. There was a vest to reinforce the protection over my vital organs. A small white earpiece that attached to my collar by a wire. Beetee secured a mask to my belt that I didn't have to wear unless there was a gas attack.

"If you see anyone dropping for reasons you can't explain, put it on immediately," Beetee explained.

"Okay."

This armor was definitely no less impressive than the first set. But it looked even more dangerous. I looked like a real soldier. Fancy and strong, but a soldier. Definitely a Mockingjay. Without the makeup, I looked like that girl who had killed the wolf muttation, stood up against the Careers, and threatened my own life. But I was stronger now. More determined. Finally, Beetee handed me the bow and he strapped a sheath divided into three cylinders of arrows to my back.

"Just remember: Right side, fire. Left side, explosive. Center, regular. You shouldn't need them, but better safe than sorry," Beetee explained.

"Great," I said.

The two of us stood together to ensure that everything on my costume was correct. Clearly he wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to be hurt out there, just in case something went wrong. I knew that it would. I was destined to be hurt out there. It would only be so long before the Capitol found out that I had stepped out of my safe place. Boggs eventually showed up to escort me down to the Airborne Division. Just as the elevator arrived, Finnick appeared in a state of agitation.

"Aspen!" Finnick cried.

"Hey, Finnick. You okay?" I asked slowly.

"They won't let me go! I told them I'm fine, but they won't even let me ride in the hovercraft!" Finnick said irritably.

Maybe they should have just let him ride in the hovercraft... Just to avoid the argument... But then I really took in Finnick's appearance for the first time since that day in the hovercraft - his bare legs showing between his hospital gown and slippers, his tangle of hair, the half-knotted rope twisted around his fingers, the wild look in his eyes - and knew that any plea on my part would be useless. Even I didn't think that it was a good idea to bring him.

"Umm... It might not be a good idea to have you on the war front for a while. Just a few more days. Maybe during the next trip?" I offered, trying to comfort him.

"But I'm really fine!" Finnick insisted.

Just like me, he clearly wanted to do something to not constantly think of Annie, the way that I so often thought of Cato. So I smacked my hand on my forehead and said, "Oh, I forgot. It's this stupid concussion. I was supposed to tell you to report to Beetee in Special Weaponry. He's designed a new trident for you."

At the word trident, it was as if the old Finnick surfaced. "Really? What's it do?"

"I don't know. But if it's anything like my bow and arrows, you're going to love it. You'll need to train with it, though," I said.

"Right. Of course. I guess I better get down there," Finnick said.

"Finnick? Maybe some pants?" I suggested.

There was no way that they were going to let him down there in a hospital gown. They barely wanted me there in my Mockingjay suit. Finnick looked down at his legs as if noticing his outfit for the first time. Then he whipped off his hospital gown, leaving him in just his underwear. I snorted loudly. To Finnick's credit, he definitely had something to be proud of. Just like Cato, his body was riddled with muscle. But Finnick also glowed with the natural tan of District 4.

"Why? Do you find this," Finnick struck a ridiculously provocative pose, "distracting?"

For the first time in a long time, I let myself loose in public. I couldn't help laughing because it was funny, and it was extra funny because it made Boggs look so uncomfortable. They really didn't like any type of nudity or affection in Thirteen. I was even happier because Finnick actually sounded like the guy that I met so long ago, just when I had arrived to the Capitol for my first Games. It would have been interesting if we had known back then where we would end up.

"I'm only human, Odair." I got in before the elevator doors closed. "Finnick, you're looking better," I called seriously.

"So are you. Not that it's very hard. You've always been so ugly," Finnick said.

There he is. Just like me, Finnick was slowly coming back to himself. "Ah, I've missed you," I said.

"Be careful out there," Finnick said, standing at the edge of the elevator.

"I'm not hugging you until you put your pants on," I said seriously.

Finnick almost smiled. "Don't die out there."

"Don't worry, I see to be a little hard to kill."

We smiled at each other. For the first time in a long time, I had some faith that we could all get back to normal once this was over. It was possible. I honestly believed that. Finnick turned back and walked off with a small smile. I couldn't help but to smile back. He looked so much happier these days. I knew that he wouldn't be completely happy until he could get Annie back, though. I knew how he felt. I wouldn't be completely okay until I could get Cato back.

"Sorry about him," I told Boggs.

"Don't be. I thought you... handled that well. Better than my having to arrest him, anyway," Boggs said.

"Yeah," I said.

Besides the first time that I had seen him in the old hospital room, I had never really looked at Boggs before. But even that had just been brief. So I snuck a sidelong glance at him. He was probably in his mid-forties, with close-cropped gray hair and blue eyes. Incredible posture. He had spoken out twice today in ways that made me think he would rather be friends than enemies. Maybe I should have given him a chance. But he just seemed so in step with Coin...

Could I trust someone that I thought was just like Coin? No. Because I didn't trust her. I would never trust her. But Boggs seemed to be the tinniest bit fond of me. He seemed to want to protect me. I supposed that today would show me just how much my life meant to him. There was suddenly a series of loud clicks. I glanced up instantly. Was the elevator about to collapse? That would have been an interesting end to the Mockingjay. The elevator came to a slight pause and then began to move laterally to the left.

"It goes sideways?" I asked.

"Yes. There's a whole network of elevator paths under Thirteen. This one lies just above the transport spoke to the fifth airlift platform. It's taking us to the Hangar," Boggs answered.

The Hangar. The dungeons. Special Defense. The Collective. Somewhere food is grown. Power generated. Air and water purified. All of the places that everyone lived. The mess hall. The War Room. The Remake Room. The hospital wing. All of those places that interconnected with each other. The outdoor training areas and fences that led to the woods that surrounded District 13.

"Thirteen is even larger than I thought," I said.

"Can't take credit for much of it. We basically inherited the place. It's been all we can do to keep it running," Boggs said.

Inherited the place? What was that supposed to mean? I assumed that he meant that this was the place where Thirteen had once only done their graphite mining. That made sense to me. This was only a fraction of what Thirteen had once been. Still, for a place that was all underground, it was enormous. The clicks resumed. We dropped down again briefly - just a couple of levels - and the doors opened up on the Hangar. It was the first time that I had seen it.

"Oh," I let out involuntarily at the sight of the fleet. Row after row of different kinds of hovercraft. "Did you inherit these, too?"

"Some we manufactured. Some were part of the Capitol's air force. They've been updated, of course," Boggs said.

I felt that twinge of hatred against Thirteen again. "So, you had all this, and you left the rest of the Districts defenseless against the Capitol," I commented.

"It's not that simple," Boggs shot back. "We were in no position to launch a counterattack until recently. We could barely stay alive. After we'd overthrown and executed the Capitol's people, only a handful of us even knew how to pilot. We could've nuked them with missiles, yes. But there's always the larger question: If we engage in that type of war with the Capitol, would there be any human life left?"

"That sounds like what Cato said. And you all called him a traitor," I countered.

"Because he called for a cease-fire. You'll notice neither side has launched nuclear weapons. We're working it out the old-fashioned way," Boggs said.

"Yes. That would be unfair, wouldn't it?" I asked grouchily, referring to the nuclear weapons.

"We're trying to hold some semblance of humanity. Fairness," Boggs said.

"Like the Games? Those weren't too fair either or humane, in case I recall correctly," I said.

For a moment, Boggs stared at me. He didn't dare say anything back, because, of course, I was the person that knew them. "Over here, Soldier Antaeus," Boggs finally said.

It was another one of those moments where I had clearly surprised him. He merely stared at me inquisitively, as if trying to read my mind. He then indicated one of the smaller hovercraft. I mounted the stairs and found it packed with the television crew and equipment. Everyone else was dressed in Thirteen's dark gray military jumpsuits, even Haymitch, although he seemed unhappy about the snugness of his collar. I felt very awkward about my costume, which now felt a little silly.

It felt like I was still just trying to play dress-up during the war. But I didn't have much time to concern myself with what I was wearing. At that moment, Fulvia Cardew hustled over and made a sound of frustration when she saw my clean face. At least Finnick's comments about me being ugly were jokes. Effie and the Prep Team might have made some rude comments, but they genuinely liked me. Fulvia merely thought that I was ugly and didn't like me.

"All that work, down the drain. I'm not blaming you, Aspen. It's just that very few people are born with camera-ready faces. Like him." She snagged Gale, who was in a conversation with Plutarch, and spun him toward us. "Isn't he handsome?"

The uniforms made anyone that could fill them out look good. They were clearly made for men, as all of the women looked terrible in them. It was evidence enough by the way that Katniss had already shooed away Fulvia when they had tried to make her up. She only looked a little less tired than I did. Gale had always had a natural attractiveness to him. He did look striking in the uniform, I guessed. But the question just embarrassed us both, given our history.

I was still trying to think of a witty comeback, when Boggs said brusquely, "Well, don't expect us to be too impressed. We just saw Finnick Odair in his underwear."

Everyone's heads whipped towards him. But I was the only person who laughed. Everyone else was clearly trying to figure out what was happening with Boggs. Whether or not we could really trust him. Trusting him was one thing, but I decided to go ahead and like Boggs. The next part would come later. Gale and Katniss gave me a strange look, but I shrugged my shoulders. They pushed away from Fulvia and came to stand at my sides.

"At least we can be ugly together," I teased Katniss.

"You're both prettier than her," Gale said seriously.

"She's got a crush on you," I told him.

"I'll pass. I've got better things to do."

"You two ready?" Katniss asked.

Talking about crushes and relationships weren't that important right now. Like Gale had said, we had better things to do. "More than I've been in a long time. I want to see what the war front looks like," I said seriously.

"It might not be a pretty picture," Gale warned.

"I'd be surprised if it was," I said.

As the three of us stood together, waiting for takeoff, I glanced up to look around. That was when I saw a few faces that I hadn't been expecting to see. Even though I should have. They had warned me that they would be coming along. But that was weeks ago and I had almost forgotten. It was Dean, Skye, and Julie. I really did forget that I had requested them to be on the team with me. I found myself terribly nervous for them now. The Hadley's had already lost enough.

"I'll be right back," I said, looking to the other trio.

Katniss and Gale followed my gaze. "You knew that they would be on the team, right?" Katniss asked.

"Yeah. I just forgot."

"Hurry up. They're talking to us soon," Gale said.

"Alright." I walked past the other two and strode up behind the three. "You're coming?" I asked.

Julie, Skye, and Dean turned to her. "We're coming. It was part of our deal. The three of us excelled at the training periods. We requested to be on your team anyways," Dean explained.

"What about Felix and Marcus?" I asked.

They were from District 2. I had thought that they would be good enough to be here. "Not yet. Coin claimed that they're not sharpshooters just yet," Julie said.

I had a feeling that it was more because she didn't trust them. "Although she is happy that we're going. We figure that half of the reason that she's bringing us along is because she wants District 2 to see that some of us are fighting with the rebels," Skye said.

"I hate to say it, but that makes sense," I said.

The three smiled. "You nervous?" Dean asked.

"To see the war front? Yes and no. I've wanted to see it for so long, but now... I don't want to see what these people are suffering because of me."

"Everyone knows that it's worth it," Skye comforted me.

"Are you all coming down with us?" I asked.

There were a number of people here who would be staying on the hovercraft. "Yes. We've got our weapons and we're ready to go," Julie said.

They were all holding guns. "Although they say that this will be noncombatant today," Skye added.

"What do you say?" I asked curiously.

"We say that the moment the Capitol realizes that you're in District 8, they're going to have every gun pointed at you," Dean said.

He didn't look guilty for saying it. We all knew that he was right. Not only was I putting myself in danger, I was also putting the people of District 8 in danger. "Yes, I was thinking the same thing. But I'm not afraid. I'm used to it already. The only thing that I was afraid of was failing my Mockingjay duties and having Coin go back on her word to save Cato," I admitted.

"I doubt she'd do that," Julie said.

"She won't do it unless you either die or start working against her," Skye added.

"You guys ready to see this?" I asked, trying to change the subject.

"I think the real question is whether or not you're ready to see it," Dean said.

I knew what he meant. He thought that whatever I saw, I would blame myself for. He was right. "It can't be worse than District 12. This is something that I need to see," I said honestly.

"We've got your back in there," Julie said, patting me on the back.

"Your safety is the priority," Skye added.

"As always," Dean said.

"Thanks for this. Keep yourselves safe, alright? We've all lost enough," I muttered.

"That goes for you too," Skye said.

"Listen to Haymitch. If he says to get down, get down," Dean warned.

"You sound just like him," I teased.

We all laughed as I walked off. It was time to prepare for the mission. There was a warning of the upcoming takeoff and I strapped myself into a seat between Gale and Katniss, facing off with Haymitch and Plutarch. We glided through a maze of tunnels that opened out onto a platform. Some sort of elevator device lifted the craft slowly up through the levels. All at once we were outside in a large field surrounded by woods, then we rose off the platform and became wrapped in clouds.

The hovercraft was just slightly larger than the one that was used to take Tributes into the arena. Mostly because we needed more people to come along with us today. Now that the flurry of activity leading up to this mission was over, I realized that I had no idea what I was facing on this trip to District 8. Not quite what had happened in District 12, but it would be its own nightmare. In fact, I knew very little about the actual state of the war. Or what it would take to win it. Or what would happen if we did.

Knowing that I wanted to know what was happening with the war, Plutarch leaned forward to explain it to me. I knew that it was a complicated mess of webs right now, so he tried to lay it out in simple terms for me. Which I appreciated, since my head still would get fuzzy whenever I tried to think too hard about anything. First of all, every District was currently at war with the Capitol except Two, which had always had a favored relationship with our enemies despite its participation in the Hunger Games.

Just like Cato had once said, they were the least likely to join any rebellion. They got more food and better living conditions. I had seen it myself and Cato had told me. After the Dark Days and the supposed destruction of Thirteen, District 2 became the Capitol's new center of defense, although it was publicly presented as the home of the nation's stone quarries, in the same way that Thirteen was known for graphite mining. District 2 not only manufactured weaponry, it trained and even supplied Peacekeepers.

"You mean... some of the Peacekeepers are born in Two? I thought they all came from the Capitol," I said dumbly.

Did Cato know that? Probably not. Plutarch nodded. That explained why I hadn't recognized where Thread's accent had been from. It was District 2, muddled with the Capitol's. "That's what you're supposed to think. And some do come from the Capitol. But its population could never sustain a force that size. Then there's the problem of recruiting Capitol-raised citizens for a dull life of deprivation in the Districts. A twenty-year commitment to the Peacekeepers, no marriage, no children allowed.

"Some buy into it for the honor of the thing, others take it on as an alternative to punishment. For instance, join the Peacekeepers and your debts are forgiven. Many people are swamped in debt in the Capitol, but not all of them are fit for military duty. So District Two is where we turn for additional troops. It's a way for their people to escape poverty and a life in the quarries. They're raised with a warrior mind-set. You've seen how eager their children are to volunteer to be Tributes," Plutarch explained carefully.

Cato and Clove. Brutus and Enobaria. I had seen their eagerness and their blood lust, too. "Yes. I have. Up close," I said, remembering their threats, but also the kindness that they could display. "But all the other Districts are on our side?"

"Yes. Our goal is to take over the Districts one by one, ending with District Two, thus cutting off the Capitol's supply chain. Then, once it's weakened, we invade the Capitol itself. That will be a whole other type of challenge. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Plutarch explained.

"Let's bring up one thing. How do we get District 2 on our side?" Dean asked.

The discomfort was clear on his face, as it was on Skye's and Julie's. Of course. That was their home. They didn't want to see it attacked or destroyed. "Eventually we'll likely have to go there. They won't be convinced by words or propaganda speeches. They need to see action. That's the way that they are," Plutarch said.

"We can do that when the time comes," I said.

"How welcoming are they going to be for Aspen?" Skye asked.

"You tell us,” Katniss said, drawing attention to herself. "Does the District like her?"

Did they like me? Cato had said that some did and some didn't. "Honestly, it's mixed. Some people like her, some hate her. But a lot of them think that she abandoned Cato in the Quell," Julie explained.

My jaw set. "Hear that, Plutarch?" I hissed.

"Listen to them, Aspen," Seneca said, standing at my side.

"It's going to take them a lot to get on our side," Skye reasoned.

"Unless they're forced. Eventually they'll realize that they're outgunned," Gale put in.

It didn't take a genius to figure out what he meant. "You mean to start a fight," I said.

"If we need to," Gale replied.

The two of us stared at each other for a moment. "Enough people are dying. We all need to be fighting against the Capitol, not against each other. We're just going to lose more people who we can't afford to lose," I said determinedly.

"So what do you suggest?" Gale asked.

Stop killing each other. Kill Snow and move on with life. "Bring the Hadley's with us when we go. If you're okay with that, of course," I said quickly. All three nodded. "That's their home. Take Felix and Marcus and the other refugees back. They might not listen to me, but there's a chance that they'll listen to their own. And... if you can convince her... get Coin to rescue Cato before we go."

"That would involve moving on the Capitol," Plutarch pointed out.

"I know but... you've always said that he's the one who's better with words. Who better to get them to join?" I offered.

There was a long stretch of silence. It was a good idea, but also dangerous. "That's not a bad idea, Plutarch," Seneca finally said. "If nothing else - if we're unable to rescue Cato Hadley by that time - we can form a rescue mission and present it to the people of District 2. They'll be much happier knowing that we haven't abandoned him."

"Are there any rebel forces in Two?" I asked.

"Yes, but there are many loyalists. They're not easy to fight back against," Plutarch said.

"Right now District 2 isn't our main worry," Seneca cut in.

"I think we've got a lot of worries," I mumbled.

"If we win, who would be in charge of the government?" Gale asked.

"Everyone," Plutarch told him. "We're going to form a republic where the people of each District and the Capitol can elect their own representatives to be their voice in a centralized government. Don't look so suspicious; it's worked before."

"In books," Haymitch muttered.

"In history books. And if our ancestors could do it, then we can, too," Plutarch said.

I'd heard the idea before. "A democracy," I said.

Everyone whipped around to look at me. "You read," Plutarch commented.

That was one of the few times that I hadn't slept through the mandatory history lessons. "I paid attention in a few history classes. I remember the term. I remember thinking that it would have been a better idea than what we have," I said slowly.

"Which is?" Plutarch asked, obviously testing me.

"A dictatorship," I said.

As much as I walked to believe that it was a good idea, I just couldn't. Frankly, our ancestors didn't seem much to brag about. I mean, we could have just looked at the state that they had left us in, with the wars and the broken planet. Clearly, they didn't care about what would happen to the people who came after them. They just died off, concerned with their own lives. But the republic idea sounded like an improvement over our current government.

"What happens if we lose?" I asked.

"If we lose?" Plutarch looked out at the clouds, and an ironic smile twisted his lips. "Then I would expect next year's Hunger Games to be quite unforgettable."

Uncomfortable looks were exchanged. I would definitely be back in the arena. Or, to make matters even worse, it wouldn't be me. Instead it would be Prim and Gale. Two of Rue's siblings. Aidan and Marley, no matter how old they were. Sparrow, if he managed to survive the war. Everyone who meant something to me. I was sure that they would manage to find someone from each District. Or maybe they would just take twelve District 2 rebels, and twelve District 12 rebels, and kill them. After killing me, of course.

"That reminds me." Plutarch took a vial from his vest, shook a few deep violet pills into his hand, and held them out to us. "We named them Nightlock in your honor, Aspen," Plutarch said.

"Why my honor?" I asked confusedly.

"You clearly recognized them more than once. You saved Cato's life from them. Quite the moving moment. You knew when the girl from Five had killed herself with them," Plutarch explained. It still didn't make sense to me. "You -"

"He means that dagger didn't sound quite as good," Haymitch interrupted.

As angry as I was with Haymitch - as angry as I likely always would be with him - the comment made me laugh. I wished that I could take back my laughter, but it was too late. So I merely looked away and smiled. Because there was something funny about it. It was a hint of the old Haymitch. But I was still determined to stay angry with him. I would be angry with him for a long time. Maybe forever. It would be until we got Cato back, at least.

"The rebels can't afford for any of us to be captured now. But I promise, it will be completely painless," Plutarch said.

"It's like you've never met us. Pain is a part of our lives," I commented.

Despite the truth behind my words, everyone ignored me. But it dawned on me, what this little pill was. I took a hold of a capsule, unsure of where to put it. Plutarch tapped a spot on my shoulder at the front of my left sleeve. I examined it and found a tiny pocket that both secured and concealed the pill. Even if my hands were tied, I could lean my head forward and bite it free. Cinna, it seemed, had thought of everything.

Chapter 8: Chapter Eight

Districts Eight and Thirteen were about two hours apart by hovercraft. The train took a little over three days to get from District 12 to District 8. It felt strange to know that we would be getting there quite so quickly today. It felt strange that I would really see the war in a matter of hours. District 12 had just been a wasteland. All I had seen was all of the destruction that had been left behind by the firebombs. But District 8 was going to be a full-blown war zone.

As conversations were exchanged about strategy and the upcoming visit to District 8, I sat quietly in my place in the hovercraft. We hadn't taken off quite yet, but I was sure that it would only be a matter of time. Gale and Katniss were on either of my sides and I was grateful that they were so close. I needed them. In the meantime, I could hear people chattering away in the earpiece. I was sure that Haymitch and Seneca would be ready to tell me not to do anything stupid the moment that we landed.

Across from us and down a few people were Dean, Skye, and Julie. Dean was in between the two girls, chatting away softly with them. They looked surprisingly relaxed for what was about to happen. I was very nervous. Not necessarily for what we were going to see - although that was a part of it - but to have the three of them with me. I didn't want something terrible to happen to them. Especially not after what happened with Leah during their escape from Two.

As I glanced at them, I noticed that they all had something that reminded me of the arena tokens. Theirs reminded me much of the one that Cato had brought with him. Dean had a locket with a picture on the inside. Marley was on one side and Carrie was on the other. Skye had a locket with a picture of her Victor sister and the rest of her family. Julie had a locket too, and on the inside it looked like a picture of all of her friends. Skye and Cato were the only two I recognized in it.

The whole thing made me smile. Everyone had something that they loved. Just like Cato. Just like me. Just like the rest of us. We all had someone that we were doing this for. There was always going to be someone worth fighting for. I let out a deep breath as I dropped back into my seat. I wanted my wedding ring with me, but I had known that it wasn't a good idea. I could have lost it or I could have broken it. So it was sitting on the bedside table, waiting for my return.

Would the people in District 8 notice? Probably not. They would be more concerned with the fact that I was alive. What about the people in District 2? I wanted to know what had happened to them. Were they still alive, since they apparently weren't fighting? I wasn't sure. I wanted to go see what was happening in the District, but I was positive that it would be extremely dangerous for me to be there. If any District was likely to attack and kill me, it would be District 2, despite the few there who would like to see me.

There was nothing that I could do for District 2. Not unless they decided to ask me to come and see what was happening. And I really doubted that they wanted me there. Not after what had happened to District 12. I leaned back in my seat on the hovercraft, trying to repress the urge to tuck my knees up to my chest. I couldn't look like a weak and frightened little girl. I had to be brave right now. Suddenly Plutarch got to his feet as a few new people entered the hovercraft.

"Quick introductions, Aspen," Plutarch said. I got to my feet as well to say hello to the new additions. "These people have come a long way to support the cause. This is Cressida. In my opinion one of the best up-and-coming directors in the Capitol."

"Until I up and left," Cressida told Plutarch before turning to me. "Hey."

"Hey," I greeted dumbly.

Was that really the best that I could do? Probably not. I stared at Cressida for a long time. Capitol born, obviously, just as Plutarch had said. She had a few piercings and bright blue eyes, but other than that, her face was relatively normal. It was her hair that proved her as Capitol-born. She had one half of her head shaved. The rest of her blonde hair was pulled over onto the other side of her head with a braid running back the length of the shaved portion.

She had vine tattoos all the way over the shaved part of her skull that went down to underneath the black uniform that District 13 soldiers wore. She had a gun tucked into her belt, but otherwise she was unarmed. Instead she was carrying something tiny that I assumed was the camera. The longer I looked at her, the more that I realized that she looked very familiar to me. I knew that all of the people in the Capitol looked familiar - since it was so easy to remember their strangeness - but she looked extremely familiar.

"I've seen you before," I finally commented.

Cressida smiled slightly. "Yeah. You have," she said.

"Were you a photographer during the Games?" I asked.

Cressida nodded. So that was where I had seen her. "Used to be. I worked for the Games when it was time. I was there during your first Games," Cressida explained.

Now that she mentioned it, I realized that I had seen her a number of times. When I thought about it, I realized that I had actually run into Cressida a number of times before my first Games. She was there on the platform when I had arrived in the Capitol. She had been standing next to the man that had announced that I had been caught kissing Gale at the goodbyes. She had rolled her eyes at him - seemingly very disinterested - but she had become quite interested when she'd seen my exchange with Gale.

That wasn't the only time that I had seen her. She had been there after the Tribute Parade. She was one of the people that was standing closest to Cato and I when we had had our first public conversation. I remembered how interested she had looked at our chat. She had occasionally been outside of the training room, watching and waiting for us. She had even been there during the party. I remembered her eyes being almost solely focused on me. And at the Interviews, standing backstage, watching me.

She had even been there after the Games, at the Closing Ceremonies. I remembered her looking so interested at the sight of me. But they all had been. Had she been wondering at the time, just how things would change? Had she thought that this was what would happen? Cressida had seemed so insignificant at the time - as I likely had to her too - but now I realized just how often she was around. And apparently how significant she would be in my life... in the rebellion.

The people who were standing behind her were the ones that I was assuming were the rest of Cressida's team. Especially since they were standing so close to her. Some of them were carrying cameras - all were armed. I didn't remember them, but I was sure that they had been around whenever Cressida was. That was when something else dawned on me. I hadn't seen her during the Quarter Quell. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't remember her being in the Capitol a few months ago.

"Did you work for the Quell?" I asked curiously.

Cressida shook her head. "No. We were already on our way to Thirteen," Cressida said.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because I saw what you did. I knew what was going to happen," Cressida said. Did that mean that she had hated the Capitol, or had she left because she didn't want to get caught in the crossfire? "We made the conscious decision to leave the Capitol."

"You knew that I would eventually end up in Thirteen," I commented.

Cressida nodded slowly. "I knew that you'd end up somewhere. I wanted to be the one to catch it," Cressida said, tapping the edge of her camera.

"Right," I said, unsure if I really trusted her.

There was no doubt in my mind that she wasn't going to hurt me, but did she really care about this rebellion? Or was she doing it to further her own agenda? Not that I could really blame her. She was doing whatever she could to help herself. I understood that. I had originally been planning to do whatever it took to get myself out of the Games the first time around. So I merely hung around and nodded slowly at Cressida. She seemed nice enough, but I would just have to wait and see.

Sensing the somewhat awkward air, Plutarch stepped forward and motioned in between the two of us. "Let's see what you can do. Alright. Be careful," Plutarch said.

Careful? Wasn't there supposed to be no danger on this mission? Of course, there would likely always be some danger. But that still made me nervous. What if I accidentally got these people bombed or killed because Snow somehow spotted me down on the ground? Those weren't thoughts that I could have right now. I just had to calm down. Plutarch gave me the gentle squeeze of the shoulder before turning and leaving the hovercraft. Probably best that he kept an eye on us from above.

"This is my assistant, Messalla," Cressida finally said, breaking the silence again.

My gaze slowly turned towards one of the men that was standing with her. He was the one that was standing the closest to Cressida. Instantly when I looked at him, I realized just how much he clearly meant to her. Not romantic... but friendly. Perhaps like the way that Peeta had once meant to me. Messalla was probably just a few years older than me, much like Cressida. These people - so close to my own age - had at least gotten up the guts to leave their home and support me. A girl younger than them.

Messalla turned to me and gave something that was like a half-smile. So he definitely wasn't a smiley person. Neither was I. We would get along just fine. "It's an honor to meet you," Messalla said.

A small scoff escaped me. "Honor?" I repeated.

"You mean a lot to everyone who left the Capitol for Thirteen," Messalla explained.

Maybe I was wrong about Cressida. Maybe she had left because she had really, genuinely, believed in me. "Well... I hope I can do something for you," I said awkwardly.

There were enough people that I had let down. "I'm sure you will," Messalla said.

"And your cameramen over there, Castor," Cressida continued.

My gaze turned to the next man. He was definitely someone that I would have normally been attracted to. He even somewhat resembled Cato, as a matter of fact. I smiled very slightly at him. Castor was a relatively burly man with sandy hair, a reddish beard, blue eyes, and close-bitten nails. He almost reminded me of Finnick. A cross between Finnick and Cato. That was proper. He was very tall, had nicely cropped hair, and a freshly shaved beard. I would have thought that he was a Career, not from the Capitol.

"Hello," Castor said, reaching out to shake my hand.

"Nice to meet you," I said.

Cressida motioned to the man standing next to him. "And Pollux," she introduced.

My gaze fell over to him. I noticed that he sent a quick look at Castor. I realized relatively quickly that he must have been related to Pollux. Perhaps brothers. They looked a little bit alike. Pollux gave me a quick nod, almost surprising me. The rest of the team had at least been nice enough for words. Maybe Pollux didn't like me that much. Maybe he had been dragged along by Castor and the others. I supposed that it didn't matter as I nodded back at him.

"Let's get locked in," Boggs said, walking up to us.

So we all went to our seats. Katniss scooted one more chair over to sit with Gale as I took the one next to her. I assumed that she thoughts that I should be closer to the new television crew. Since technically, they were mine. It was like the Prep Team. I didn't know how to handle them, so it was likely that they were going to have to teach me exactly how to stand in front of a camera. Just the way that the Prep Team had taught me how to act properly. As we prepared to take off, I turned to Pollux, who was next to me.

"You're all from the Capitol, then? Plutarch got you out?" I asked, over the roar of the engine.

Sitting with my bow draped across my lap, I shifted awkwardly as Pollux stared at me. That was when I realized that he, too, had a Mockingjay pinned to his heart. They all did. Even Cressida, Castor, and Messalla. Gale and Katniss didn't have them, but everyone knew that they were on my side. Neither did Dean. Skye, or Julie, but again, they were also on my side. It was the people from the Capitol that would be a surprise.

"Don't expect much chitchat from him. He's an Avox," Cressida said, drawing my attention to her. My stomach churned in knots. What had he done? Did he know Clio, Lavinia, or Darius? "Capitol cut his tongue out years ago. And, no, it wasn't any sort of rescue, if that's what you mean. It's like I said... We all fled on our own. For this. For you."

Again I started to feel a little sick. All of these people doing all of these things for me. For something that I hadn't wanted. I didn't have much time to ponder what had happened that had caused Pollux to lose his tongue. Since he couldn't speak, he must have learned sign language to communicate. He was signing something to Castor as Cressida spoke. Once he was done, Castor signed something back to him very quickly. I noticed their gazes briefly turn towards me.

Blushing slightly, I turned the other way, back towards Cressida. "What did he sign?" I asked softly.

Cressida smirked. "He said you're beautiful," Cressida told me.

The blush on my face only grew tenfold. Did he really think that I was still beautiful? I supposed that I wasn't that ugly. Actually I knew that I wasn't ugly at all. There was the issue of some uneven skin and burns, but those were thanks to the Capitol. The bags under my eyes were horrible, but those could be looked past and maybe one day they would be gone. I didn't need to ask what Castor had signed. He had agreed with Pollux by signing yes. I knew that one.

"How do I say thank you?" I asked Cressida. Or Castor. Whoever wanted to answer me.

"Like this," Castor said, demonstrating.

It was very simple. I merely placed my hand, palm facing my face, at my chin and moved it down. Pollux smiled gratefully. Maybe I could learn sign language. At least I would be able to communicate between my television team without constantly having to ask someone to translate for me whenever Pollux wanted to say something. And if I ever got the chance to see Clio, Darius, or Lavinia again... I tried to blink back thoughts of them and instead play with the string on my bow.

A big point of the flight was also ignoring the looks that I kept getting from the new team. I knew that they weren't doing it to be rude or uncomfortable. But they had left their homes for me. They had risked their lives for me. Up until now, I had probably just been a mostly abstract thought for them. I guessed that they had every right to look at me. Honestly, I should have been used to it anyways. People had been constantly staring at me for the last year and a half.

Ultimately I glanced over at Dean, Skye, and Julie. They had been almost silent since we had left District 13. "You guys okay?" I called out.

"We're ready. What about you?" Dean asked.

Don't look like a weakling in front of the people who gave up their entire lives for you. "Yes and no. I want to see what's happening out there in the war," I said, earning smiles and nods from the rest of my television team. "But... I don't want to see it at the same time. Because I'll know that it's my fault."

"It's not your fault," Katniss said, placing a hand on my knee.

"It's always going to feel like it," I said.

Everything that had happened was because I couldn't keep my damn mouth shut. "So that means that it's my fault; Prim's and Effie's, too," Katniss said. I raised a brow. "There are so many people that you can blame for this."

How many people could I blame for this? I supposed that I could blame a number of people for what had happened. I could blame everyone who had ever created the Games. I could blame our ancestors who had started the first uprising. I could blame the people who had left the world in this ruin. I could have blamed Mr. and Ms. Everdeen for ever having children. I could blame my parents for giving birth to me. I could blame Prim for her name being pulled. I could blame Katniss for my desire to protect her.

There was a never-ending list of people to put the blame on. But most of it would always fall on me. "But there's only one person who the blame really belongs to," Skye interrupted.

"That's Snow," Julie continued.

"No one else," Dean said.

There was a brief moment of silence. "They're right, Aspen," Gale said.

"I know... But I just - I don't - I don't know," I stuttered, my voice dropping off.

Where had I been planning on taking that conversation? I wasn't quite sure. Did I want to sit here and be a big baby about things that I couldn't change? No. There weren't really many people that I could complain to. Gale would be a soldier about it. He wouldn't let me complain. Not after everything. Not to Ms. Everdeen or Prim. I shielded them. Not to the television crew. I didn't know them. Not to the Hadley's. They had enough on their minds. Not anyone in Thirteen. It only left Seneca and Katniss, but even them...

"I've watched you since that first time in the arena," Cressida said, breaking my train of thought. "I've watched you during the preparations for them. You're the type of person who builds up nerves. You become terrified when you work yourself up. But when you're there, when you see things for yourself, you know exactly what to say and what to do. That'll happen today."

My gaze turned to her. Surprising words for someone who really didn't know me that well. "Thank you for the faith," I said slowly.

"It's not misplaced. We all believe in you," Messalla said.

"That's one of us," I said.

To my surprise, they all smiled. "I have something that you might want to see," Cressida said.

"Okay," I said.

She was pulling her camera back out. What could they have possibly shot that they thought that I wanted to see? My pathetic acting? Cressida unlatched herself from her seat and walked over to kneel down in front of me. I leaned forward and moved my bow out of my lap to give her some room to come closer. Katniss and Gale shifted off to the side to allow her a little bit of room. She was currently fiddling with the camera as I glanced at the back of the case.

It was so much smaller than a lot of the ones that I had seen in the Capitol. It was clearly one that was made to be used when we were running around. Lightweight and small. When she opened the screen at the side of the camera, I looked down at it. There was a video of something or another. All of us were staring at each other confusedly. What was this supposed to be? Clearly no one else knew. Cressida hit the freeze button as an image appeared, before the video could play.

Cressida looked over at me and took a deep breath. "I was standing at the loading bay to take some videos and pictures before the start of the Games," she explained.

"Okay," I said.

"This is one of the ones that I took," Cressida continued.

Was it of Haymitch and me? I remembered that day well enough. It definitely stood out in my mind. Finally she hit play and the video began to play. I stared at it confusedly for another moment before it finally registered what it was that I was looking at. The image that formed made me slap a hand over my mouth. Everyone's head snapped to me. Katniss's hand instantly came to rest on my knee. It was the morning of my first Games. Brutus and Cato were heading to the hovercraft. Cato was in the Tribute outfit.

"You know what to do, kid," Brutus said over the video.

"I'm ready," Cato said determinedly.

Even before getting on the hovercraft he looked excited. "Take a deep breath. Last minute advice," Brutus ordered. Cato nodded. "Keep a level head in there. You'd be shocked how many Careers die because they overreact to something or get angry. No revenge for anything. If you do, take a long time to think about it."

That must have been something that Brutus had ignored. I could remember Cato almost always instantly reacting after something had happened. Running after the girl from District 3 had almost killed him. Going for the boy from District 6 first. Hurting Peeta after he had betrayed the Careers. Vying to hunt me down after I had dropped the Tracker Jackers. Trying to kill Thresh after he had killed Clove. There had been so many other times too. Probably many that I hadn't even seen.

"Move fast. You've got a few people who are faster than you who can beat you to the Cornucopia," Brutus continued.

"I know. It's only the girl from Five. She'll head away," Cato said.

"Remember Johanna Mason?" It was the same thing that I had been thinking at the time. It was why I had always been weary of Finch. "Be weary of everyone. Your girlfriend's fast, too," Brutus continued.

Did he mean me? Had he already known? The shock registered in Cato's eyes. "Twelve?" Cato asked.

"Yes, Twelve. The one you keep coming after," Brutus said nastily. "If she beats you there, she's a good shot."

"She won't hit me," Cato said confidently.

No... I would do something much worse. "That's what you think. Cato. You stay away from her. Nothing good's there. Only one of you makes it out of this," Brutus warned.

There was something almost pained in Cato's eyes. He had mentioned to me before that he had already been falling for me before even setting foot in the arena. That night up on the roof... Brutus must have been concerned about the same thing that Haymitch had been concerned about. Of course. We hadn't exactly made it very secretive that we, in some strange way, cared about each other even before the Games. But Cato had been a Career. He was supposed to get over his crush on me.

"I know. I'll kill her," Cato finally said, almost hesitantly.

"Where were you last night?" Brutus asked sharply.

"Went for a walk," Cato said carelessly.

"Up to the roof? Right outside of the District 12 penthouse?" Brutus asked.

Knowing that he had been caught, Cato shifted on his feet slightly. "I'll kill her, alright?" Cato said snappily.

"Don't let her play you. Get out there and come back. This girl doesn't mean anything. Understood?" Brutus asked, placing a hand on Cato's shoulder.

There was a brief hesitation between the men. "Understood," Cato finally said.

Suddenly the screen faded as the scene came to an end. That must have been the end of what Cressida had filmed. I was surprised that I had never seen it on a gossip show or something like that. But it dawned on me almost immediately why I hadn't seen it before. Because Cressida had kept it to herself. When I had started acting the way that I did - when everything had happened - she must have kept it with the intent to show me herself one day. Only me. No one else. Not those leeches.

The entire thing was almost funny. The corners of my lips tilted upwards. I knew that everyone was watching me, despite trying to look like they weren't eavesdropping. Brutus had given Cato almost the exact same advice that Haymitch had given me. Maybe they were trying to work together. To stay away from me, just the way that Haymitch had warned me to stay away from Cato. I nodded gratefully at Cressida as she closed the camera. Even back then, Cato hadn't wanted to kill me.

"I thought that you might want to see that one day," Cressida said.

"Thank you," I muttered.

It was funny to see him like that. He was so young. So dumb. "You're welcome. Security footage saw the two of you up on the roof that night," Cressida continued. My heart lodged in my throat. They'd heard us that night? "Couldn't catch your voices, but I'm sure that Brutus knew that you were up there."

At least they couldn't hear us. I didn't want anyone hearing me that night. "Probably. He never liked me," I said.

"He still doesn't like you," Julie said, referring to Brutus.

"The feeling is mutual," I muttered.

"I don't know. The two of you seem to be on slightly better terms these days," Dean said.

Well we hadn't tried to kill each other recently. That was an improvement from before. "That's mostly because we both hate it in Thirteen and we both miss Cato," I said.

"We all hate it in Thirteen," Gale pointed out.

"We'll be out soon enough," Katniss added.

"Hopefully," I muttered.

But that was the question. How long would this war go on? And could we all go back to normal once it was over? Could we just return to our everyday life like nothing had ever happened? We would just take the Hunger Games out of our year. We could just go back to normal. Maybe the Capitol would help us out afterwards. They would give us more money and food to help us out. We could all be equal... But that was only if we won. It could be much worse if we lost.

"You alright?" Gale asked, breaking my thoughts.

"I'll manage. This is what I wanted, to be out and on the battlefield. But now that I'm heading out there... I'm not so sure that I'm ready to see it," I said honestly.

"They'll be happy to see you. The people believe in you. You don't have to do anything but speak," Gale said.

"When have you ever known me to be a good speaker?" I asked. Gale laughed, along with Katniss and Julie. But the air turned from happy to somber in a matter of moments. "Say what? Tell them that I'm sorry that I caused this? Tell them that I'm sorry that I've ruined their lives?"

"Tell them that you're fighting for them," Gale offered.

That was about all that I could say to the people right now. "You two will stay with me while we're in there, right?" I asked Katniss and Gale.

Katniss grabbed onto my knee. "We won't leave," she promised.

Gale's hand fell on my shoulder. "We're going to be right there."

The two of them being with me was exactly what I needed. They had always provided me the strength to do something whenever I couldn't force myself to do it. We continued on our flight to District 8 as I chatted back and forth with the new team. Cressida was nicer than I had originally pegged her for. She actually liked to laugh and had a good, albeit teasing, sense of humor. I had a feeling that Cato would like her whenever we got him back from the Capitol.

Then there were the others. The other members of the team. Messalla had a deep and smooth voice. I liked listening to him talk. Like the others, he was rather funny. It surprised me from people who were born in the Capitol. Castor promised to spend some time teaching me sign language so that I could speak freely with Pollux. I had thanked him and promised Pollux that we would be able to talk soon enough. Katniss and Gale seemed to have their reservations for the new additions - but so did I, on some level.

It was nice being able to talk to them and momentarily forget about District 8 and what we were going to find there. Now that we were approaching, I found myself very nervous to see what was happening in a place where the war was actually being fought. The hovercraft gave a small jolt and I looked up. We must have been getting close. It was proven the moment that I heard a voice at the front of the hovercraft shouting to prepare for descent into Eight.

We were finally here. Almost. Apparently we had to take a slightly circuitous route to avoid any potential bombers from seeing us. Eventually we started the final approach to District 8. We would be able to land in a matter of minutes. The hovercraft started making a quick, spiral descent onto a wide road on the outskirts of Eight. The central bombing was happening in the City Center apparently. Almost immediately, the door opened, the stairs slid into place, and we were spit out onto the asphalt.

First we were all ordered not to get off of the hovercraft. Boggs wanted us to assemble together first. "This has gotta be fast. In and out," Boggs instructed.

Everyone nodded at him. No one wanted to linger here anyways. Not knowing what we were likely to find in the lower middle class District. But we all got off of the hovercraft anyways. The moment the last person disembarked, the equipment retracted. Then the craft lifted off and vanished. It would likely be able to land without issue when it was time to leave. By either emergency or just simply when the time came to leave. Disembarking the hovercraft, I noticed that I was left in the middle of everyone.

Now I was left with a bodyguard made up of Gale, Katniss, Skye, Julie, Dean, Boggs, and two other soldiers. Plus we still had the television crew with us. The pair of burly Capitol cameramen with heavy mobile cameras encasing their bodies like insect shells was enough to make me laugh. I had just noticed that they looked like insects. On closer inspection, I realized that Cressida's tattooed vines were green, and Messalla had his tongue pierced, too. He wore a stud with a silver ball the size of a marble.

"Move out," Boggs called.

Boggs hustled us off the road toward a row of warehouses as a second hovercraft came in for a landing. That one looked to be bringing crates of medical supplies and a crew of six medics - I could tell by their distinctive white outfits. We all followed Boggs down an alley that ran between two dull gray warehouses. Only the occasional access ladder to the roof interrupted the scarred metal walls. When we emerged onto the street, it was like we had entered another world.

It looked just like District 12 had looked after the Capitol had dropped firebombs on it. I could only assume that they had dropped the same things on District 8. I was instantly horrified by the sight of the place. There must have been hundreds dead already. This was the City Center. It had likely had the highest population during the bombing. A population bomb. Dropping a bomb on what was likely a place to have the most severe impact. Take out as many rebels as possible and warn the rest to stop fighting.

The wounded from this morning's bombing were being brought in. On homemade stretchers, in wheelbarrows, on carts, slung across shoulders, and clenched tight in arms. Bleeding, limbless, unconscious. Propelled by desperate people to a warehouse with a sloppily painted H above the doorway. It was a scene from my old kitchen, where Ms. Everdeen treated the dying, multiplied by ten, by fifty, by a hundred. I had expected bombed-out buildings and instead found myself confronted with broken human bodies.

Suddenly I remembered Cato's wounded leg from the Quell. I almost stumbled back and collapsed. But I forced myself to keep walking. I couldn't be a coward right now. But his horrible leg. I kept seeing his scared and eaten-away leg from the poison fog. How it had been half-eaten by the end of the Games. I had never been able to deal with other people's pain. I couldn't even look at my own wounds after both times I had been burned. I couldn't act like a weeping fool here. I had to be the symbol of a rebellion.

That was when I realized what was happening right now. This was the wrong place for me to be. I wanted to be shooting arrows, proving that I was still useful even after what had happened to me in the Quell, rather than standing here and observing the damage. This wasn't the place that I could be strong. This was the place where I was going to fall apart. This couldn't really have been where they were planning on filming me? I turned to Boggs.

"This won't work. I won't be good here," I told Boggs.

My legs were locking up and I felt my spine straightening out. I knew what was happening. I was panicking; the beginnings of a panic attack were settling into my stomach. I had been through this enough times to know what was happening. My hand reached out for Cato, who I always went to during panic attacks, but he wasn't here. But someone else was. Boggs must have seen the panic in my eyes, because he stopped for a moment and placed his hands on my shoulders.

"You will. Just let them see you. That will do more for them than any doctor in the world could," Boggs said.

"I'm - I'm - This isn't -"

"We're right here," Gale said, coming to stand at my side. "You're fine."

"Come on," Katniss whispered.

They were at my sides with Boggs in front of me. I appreciated them being with me right now. I was positive that - unlike District 12 - this wasn't something I could do on my own. Although Katniss was trying to get me to walk, she didn't look any happier about this than I was. Neither one of us had ever been good with wounds. This had almost been her in my place. This was the one spot where we would have been even, no matter who had gone into the Games. Neither one of us would have been okay with this.

A woman directing the incoming patients caught sight of us, did a sort of double take, and then strode over. Her dark brown eyes were puffy with fatigue and she smelled of metal and sweat. A bandage around her throat needed changing about three days ago. The strap of the automatic weapon slung across her back dug into her neck and she shifted her shoulder to reposition it. With a jerk of her thumb, she ordered the medics into the warehouse. They complied without question.

She must have been the leader of the rebellion here. I could assume just by the sight of her that she hadn't been the mayor before the bombings here. She had dark skin - much like Rue and Thresh - and I cringed slightly at the sight of her. There was a bandana wrapped around her head that went over the wrapping around her throat. She wore a deep purple tank top and a pair of khaki pants. Unfortunately she looked like she hadn't had a full meal in a while.

"Aspen, this is Commander Paylor of Eight. Commander, Soldier Aspen Antaeus," Boggs said.

That woman was a commander? She looked far too young to be a commander. Early thirties, if even that much. But there was an authoritative tone to her voice that made you feel as though her appointment wasn't arbitrary. She already put off a much tougher air than I did. Beside her, in my spanking-new outfit, scrubbed and shiny, I felt like a recently hatched chick, untested and only just learning how to navigate the world, despite the fact that I had lived through the Hunger Games twice.

"Yeah, I know who she is. You're alive, then. We weren't sure," Paylor said.

For a moment I just stared at her. She stared right back at me. It was obvious enough that neither one of us really knew what we were supposed to say. It was obvious enough that Paylor didn't like me. And I couldn't blame her. Not from the vast difference between the two of us. Here I was, standing in armor that must have cost more than the District we were in, while she was using a dirty rag as a bandage. Was I wrong or was there a note of accusation in her voice?

"I'm still not sure myself," I answered.

"Been in recovery." Boggs tapped his head. "Bad concussion." He lowered his voice for a moment. "Miscarriage."

Paylor's eyebrows quirked. "That so?" she asked.

The direction was pointed at me. "Yes," I said, trying to force a heartbroken look on my face.

It was a good thing that my voice cracked halfway through the word. Paylor's face fell just ever-so-slightly. I felt terrible for lying, but I couldn't give up the act. "Sorry to hear that," Paylor said.

"It's okay. I didn't just much of a chance to even get used to the thought of having a child," I said.

"She insisted on coming by to see your wounded," Boggs said.

"Well, we've got plenty of those," Paylor said.

"You think this is a good idea? Assembling your wounded like this?" Gale asked, frowning at the hospital.

My gaze turned back over towards it. A large building. A few stories high. Something that was likely a warehouse for all of the textiles that District 8 used to supply. Maybe the textile mill that Bonnie and Twill had once escaped from. What would they think if they could see this place now? But as for assembling the wounded in one place, I didn't think that it was wise. Any sort of contagious disease would spread through the place like wildfire.

"I think it's slightly better than leaving them to die," Paylor said.

"That's not what I meant," Gale told her.

"Well, currently that's my other option. But if you come up with a third and get Coin to back it, I'm all ears." Paylor waved me toward the door. "Come on in, Mockingjay. And by all means, bring your friends," Paylor called.

The tone in her voice told me that it might not have been me that she hated. It was just the situation. She was tired and clearly a little heartbroken at the sight of the war. They definitely lost a large amount of people during the raid this morning. I knew what Gale had meant though. Not to leave these people to die, but maybe to try and spread them out a little more. Although that would leave some of them a little more susceptible to an attack if they were more spread out.

Immediately though I realized that the people did like me. The people in the Capitol had once loved me. Now the people in the Districts loved me because I was trying to stand up for their rights. But it was the people like Paylor, the commanders and high-ups of the rebellion, who didn't like me. They hated me. They were thinking just what I feared. They thought that I was hiding out and only coming out when it worked for me, where I could be safe. Which was essentially what they had been forcing me to do.

It was that which made me feel even worse about everything. I had been hiding in District 13 for weeks since the end of the Quarter Quell. Not that it had always been my choice, but I had still been hiding there. I should have been out here with these people. Maybe dead, but I should have been out here. After all, I was the person who had started this whole thing. My stupid actions and that one damned arrow. I shouldn't have been hidden away and being pampered like I was being in District 13.

Just before we walked off, I glanced back at the freak show that was my crew, steeled myself, and followed her into the hospital. Not a place that I wanted to be, but a place that I knew I would have to see. The rest of the Districts needed to see this. To know that they weren't the only ones who were suffering. Some sort of heavy, industrial curtain hung the length of the building, forming a sizable corridor. Corpses laid side by side, curtains brushing their heads, white cloths concealing their faces.

"We've got a mass grave started a few blocks west of here, but I can't spare the manpower to move them yet. Hospital's past that curtain. Any hope you can give them, it's worth it. The Capitol's done everything they can to break us," Paylor said.

Was this place really that big? I hoped that we might find only ten or fifteen people seriously injured. Maybe fifty, at most. But I had a feeling that it was going to be a much larger number. There were already at least thirty bodies that I had walked past. And a mass grave... How many people could possibly have been in there? How many people were going to be placed in that mass grave? Paylor found a slit in the curtain and opened it wide. I looked away before looking in there.

My fingers wrapped around Gale and Katniss's wrists. "Do not leave my side," I said under my breath.

"I'm right here," Gale answered quietly.

"We're right here. You'll be okay," Katniss whispered.

No one wanted to speak that loudly. No one wanted to be the ones who were suffering. We weren't the ones who were suffering. Not right now. They were the ones who were suffering. As I glanced at Katniss's face, I could tell that she might have been even less happy about this than I was. She was even worse with the sick and injured than I was. Probably because they reminded her of her father. If there was anyone who hated this more than me, it was Katniss. But she would be strong for me.

"What do I do?" I asked softly.

"Just walk," Katniss ordered.

"Show them you're alive," Gale said.

"It's going to be okay. They just want to see you," Dean said.

"This is..."

My voice was stuck in my throat. How was I supposed to speak to them? "It's horrible, we know. But go talk to them. Just show them that you're still alive and ready to fight," Skye whispered, pressing a hand on my back.

"Come on. We're right here," Julie said softly.

There was only one more, thin, curtain separating us from the area where the wounded and dying would be. Were they all alive in there? Were they dying? Was I going to have to watch even more people die in front of me? I supposed that it didn't matter. It would be horrible, no matter what. Paylor pulled open the last curtain to show me the inside of the hospital. The entire place was full of sick and wounded and dying people. I didn't turn, but I leaned back slightly to Cressida.

"Don't film me in there. I can't help them," I whispered weakly.

"Just let them see your face," Cressida said. She grabbed onto my arm. "Huh?"

What if I threw up all over them? That was definitely very likely. But I couldn't. I had to force myself to keep walking and get to meet this people. It was the smallest thing that I could do. This was something that I had to do. So I slowly nodded my head at her, not that I was sure if she was watching me or not. But her camera was on. She would see this. So I steeled my face again. If they were going to take a video of me in here that would be broadcasted to the Districts, I couldn't look weak.

Very slowly and fearfully, I stepped through the curtain. Instantly all of my senses were assaulted. My first impulse was to cover my nose to block out the stench of soiled linen, putrefying flesh, and vomit, all ripening in the heat of the warehouse. But that wasn't something that I could do. How heartless would I look if I did something like that? These people were fighting for me. I could at least look strong for them for this one day. I had seen worse. I would still see worse. This was nothing.

They had propped open skylights that crisscrossed the high metal roof, but any air that was managing to get in couldn't make a dent in the fog below. The thin shafts of sunlight provided the only illumination, and as my eyes adjusted, I could make out row upon row of wounded, in cots, on pallets, and on the floor because there were so many to claim the space. The drone of black flies, the moaning of people in pain, and the sobs of their attending loved ones had combined into a wrenching chorus.

There had to be at least three hundred people in here. We had no real hospitals in the Districts. We died at home, which at the moment seemed a far desirable alternative to what laid in front of me. This was a miserable place to have to live out your final moments. Then I remembered that many of these people probably lost their homes in the bombings. Thanks to me. As I walked into the hospital, Cressida started motioning for the camera crew and the rest of my team to follow me at a slight distance.

Sweat began to run down my back and fill my palms. I breathed through my mouth in an attempt to diminish the smell. Black spots swam across my field of vision, and I thought that there was a really good chance that I could faint. In fact, I was sure that I was about to faint. But then I caught sight of Paylor, who was watching me so closely, her eyes glued to my body, waiting to see what I was made out of, and if any of them had been right to think that they could count on me.

Yes. That was my answer. They were the ones who could count on me. Everyone could count on me. Right now more than ever. So I let go of Gale and Katniss and forced myself to move deeper into the warehouse, to walk into the narrow strip between two rows of beds. They would realize who I was soon enough. It might take some time, but they would eventually spot me. Armor, bow and arrows, Mockingjay pin, and the braid. I would have been very hard to mistake for someone else.

People were running back and forth everywhere. It was clear enough to see that the entire hospital was in a panic. Sounds were echoing from every corner. Bouncing off of the steel walls. Screams for dying loved ones. Shouted orders. Pleading with others for help. Thanking the uninjured who were walking around with the bits of food and blankets that they could spare. That must have been it. Far too little for what they really needed.

As I walked past three children, my gut wrenched again. Little kids, one too young to have even been entered in the Games, the other two around Katniss's age or maybe a little younger. One was clutching her arm. It looked like she had been either shot or gotten a chunk of shrapnel caught in the bone. Another had a man pressing down on their arm. Did they have to amputate it? The last had a woman covering his bloody ear with a bandage. Was he deaf from a blast? I knew how that felt.

On the other side of the stretchers was a man with a bloody gash in his throat, clearly making it hard to breathe. I cringed and looked away again. I was still forcing my feet to continue on, as much as I wanted to stop and run away. Looking at all of these people was horrible. Everything that they had suffered for something that I had started. Heads were slowly starting to turn up to look at me. People were finally catching on to who I was. The chatter was slowly quieting. People were rising to their feet.

All desperate to catch a glimpse of the woman that they had thought to be dead. "Aspen?" a voice croaked out from my left, breaking apart from the general din. "Aspen?"

A hand reached out for me out of the haze. Without even bothering to look at who it was, I clung to it for support. Attached to the hand was a young woman with an injured leg. Maybe a few years younger than me. Blood had now seeped through the heavy bandages, which were crawling with flies. Infection. Painful. I knew that much. Her face reflected her pain, just as mine once had, but something else, too, something that seemed completely incongruous with her situation.

"Hi," I whispered weakly.

"Is it really you?" she asked.

"Yeah, it's me," I got out.

My voice cracked painfully. It reminded me of the way that my voice sounded after I had managed to escape the firestorm during my first Games. It sounded like I had just been trapped in the same bombings that they had. That was when it clicked. The look on her face that I had been confused about earlier. Joy. That was the very surprising expression on her face. At the sound of my voice, the look brightened and erased the suffering momentarily.

"You're alive! We didn't know. People said you were, but we didn't know!" she said excitedly.

"I got pretty banged up. But I got better. Just like you will," I said.

"I've got to tell my brother!" she cried.

"Let me help you," I said.

Whatever had hit her must have hurt. The woman struggled to sit up even with my help and called to someone a few beds down. "Eddy! Eddy! She's here! It's Aspen Hadley!"

There was another painful jolt in my stomach when I realized what had just happened. Despite everything, despite their hatred of the Career Districts, they were calling me by my married name. They didn't know that the wedding that the Capitol had thrown before the Quell had been a sham to get our families into the Capitol to tell them about the plan to evacuate us. They didn't know how much I had been used as a puppet, even when it had seemed like I was in charge.

The person that she was yelling to turned to us. It was a boy, probably about twelve years old. Too young for this, just like Rue had been. Bandages obscured half of his face. The side of his mouth that I could see opened as if to utter an exclamation. I ran to him, letting go of the girl, and pushed his damp brown curls back from his forehead. Murmured a greeting. He couldn't speak, but his one good eye fixed on me with such intensity, as if he was trying to memorize every detail of my face.

Those people who were close by were watching what was happening. Those back in the far corners of the hospital still hadn't noticed what was happening. There were too many of them who were focused on the other things that were happening. The things that were happening with their own families. People who were begging each other to stay with them. Everyone was tending to the wounded. Those faces of pain and horror were terrible. All of these people... they weren't even soldiers.

They were just normal people, fighting for me. Each and every one of them. I pressed a small kiss to Eddy's forehead, trying to be careful and not hurt him, before gently letting go of him and walking off. There were other people who needed to see me. There were other people who I needed to speak to. Despite trying to remain strong, I felt myself becoming overly-emotional when I saw just how bad this really was. The hospital took about another ten seconds before fully falling silent. They all knew who I was.

"Aspen... Antaeus?" a young woman called, shattering the tense silence. I whirled around to look at her. She had a bloody forehead that was covered with a bandana. She was looking at me like I wasn't even real. "What are you doing here?"

"I came... I came to see you," I stuttered.

"What about the baby?" an older woman a few feet down asked.

I turned to her and forced out the lie. "I lost it," I said, my voice cracking painfully.

Lying to them was terrible. Telling them the truth would have been worse. "Are you fighting, Aspen?" a young man's voice asked. I turned towards a young boy with a gun slung over his back. "Are you here to fight with us?"

My head very slowly nodded. "I am. I will," I said.

All of this was my fault. I was the person who had started all of this, be damned what anyone else said. Their lives had turned into this because of me. And I would help them end it, no matter what the cost. No one would ever die to the Hunger Games again. The boy nodded, placing three fingers against his lips and giving me the same three-fingered salute that was almost as synonymous to me as was the Mockingjay. Within seconds, so had the rest of the hospital. Tears building in my eyes, I looked at them all.

Just behind me, Cressida was whispering to Pollux, "Tighter. Tighter, tighter."

Every single person sitting on the beds and standing up were giving me the three-fingered salute. The one that I hadn't earned. But the one that I would accept. This was what had happened to me. This was what I would have to live with. My tears were threatening to fall. But it wasn't from weakness this time. It was from the overwhelming sense of hope that I felt around these people. The way that it was reciprocated from them. I heard my name rippling through the hot air, spreading out into the hospital.

"Aspen! Aspen Antaeus! Aspen Hadley!"

The sounds of pain and grief began to recede, the silence from the salute having been broken, to be replaced by words of anticipation. From all sides, voices beckoned me. It was impossible to see them all. There were so many people here who wanted to see me. I began to move around, clasping the hands that were extended to me, touching the sound parts of those unable to move their limbs, saying hello, how are you, and good to meet you. To each and every person.

Enough to keep me in there for hours. Everything that I was saying was nothing of importance and there were no amazing words of inspiration. But it didn't matter. Boggs was right. It was the sight of me, alive, that was the inspiration. It was what I had to do. Just be here for them. I tried to spend as much time as I could talking to each person, but new hands would grab onto me and pull me over to them. None of them stopped me from leaving. They simply listened and touched me until they no longer could.

Having people touch me was not one of my favorite things in the world. In fact, not long ago I had hated anyone outside of my family touching me. But not right now. These people had suffered enough. If that was what they wanted to do, touch me for just a moment, they were more than welcome to touch me. Because they deserved that much. I brushed back their hair from their foreheads, tried to help wash away dirt and blood, and promise them that things would get better.

Hungry fingers devoured me, wanting to feel my flesh. As a stricken man clutched my face between his hands, I sent a silent thank-you to Dalton for suggesting that I wash off the makeup. How ridiculous, how perverse I would feel presenting that painted Capitol mask to these people. It would have ensured that Paylor hated me and shown the people of District 8 that I was still the Capitol's puppet. The damage, the fatigue, and the imperfections. That was how they recognized me, why I belonged to them.

Despite his controversial interview with Caesar, many asked about Cato. Despite him having been from a Career District - Two, which had always been the most hated - people had slowly started liking him. They had seen him turning a man who could have come from any of the other Districts. They had seen him turn into someone who would do anything for love. They saw the same man that I did. Almost everyone assured me that they knew that he was speaking under duress.

That was what I appreciated. They knew that he wasn't still a slave to the Capitol. Not now. Maybe they could help me sway District 2 onto our side when the time came. I did my best to sound positive about our future, but people were truly devastated when they learned that I had lost the baby. I wanted to come clean and tell one weeping woman that it was all a hoax, a move in the game, but to present Cato as a liar now would not help his image. Or mine. Or the cause.

So I had to go with it. People asked everything about the baby. They promised me that I would have made a good mother. They promised that once I had Cato back with me - when the war was over - we would get to try again. Each person who cried for my loss and told me stories of their own got me just a little bit closer to telling them the truth about what had really happened. But I couldn't. Telling them that I had never been pregnant would be worse. So I kept silent and thanked them for the condolences.

The more people that I spoke to, the more that I began to fully understand the lengths to which people had gone to protect me. Far more than just the people that had come with me to the Capitol. I understood what I meant to the rebels. My ongoing struggle against the Capitol, which had so often felt like a solitary journey, had not been undertaken alone. I had had thousands upon thousands of people from the Districts at my side. I was their Mockingjay long before I accepted the role.

"Aspen?" a young girl's voice came.

"Hi," I whispered

Kneeling down at her side, I saw that half of her face had been badly burned. My voice lodged in my throat, but I refused to move. Not like I had left the boy from District 9 that day in the Games. The boy whose name I still didn't know. The boy whose life I had taken so horribly. I would not do the same thing to the little girl. I would stay with her. If she died. If she lived. She would see me for as long as she could. Tears rolled down her face as I grabbed her hand, bringing it against my rapidly beating heart.

An older woman who was kneeling at her side spoke up. "This is my daughter. Velvet. She was - She was burned during a raid," the woman said, her voice breaking.

"It's okay... You're going to be okay. You're all going to be okay," I whispered.

"Will you sing to me? Like you sang to Rue?" Velvet asked.

Rue... What would you think if you could see all of this? "Y - Yes," I said.

My entire body gave a soft jolt. Everyone - even the people who couldn't walk - were insisting that others brought them forward. The hospital had once more fallen completely silent. They had all heard me sing before. To Rue at the time. To comfort her in death. Now to them. To comfort them in war. For a moment I tried to find a good song. Not Deep in the Meadow. A different one. Finally I settled on a song that Mr. Everdeen had taught me before he had died. I had never sang it to anyone but him.

"It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word

And then that word grew louder and louder
'Til it was a battle cry
I'll come back
When you call me
No need to say goodbye

Just because everything's changing
Doesn't mean it's never been this way before
All you can do is try to know who your friends are
As you head off to the war

Pick a star on the dark horizon
And follow the light
You'll come back when it's over
No need to say goodbye

You'll come back when it's over
No need to say goodbye

Now we're back to the beginning
It's just a feeling and no one knows yet
But just because they can't feel it too
Doesn't mean that you have to forget

Let your memories grow stronger and stronger
'Til they're before your eyes
You'll come back
When they call you
No need to say goodbye

You'll come back
When they call you
No need to say goodbye."

It was a rather sweet and upbeat tune. I needed to sing something that wasn't going to make me burst into tears. But it did anyways. Because that was the song that I used to think of after he had died. It was the one that had always reminded me that he wasn't gone forever. He would be back. Just like the rest of their loved ones would be back. Just like Peeta came back to visit me sometimes. We would all get to see our loved ones again. In time, we would. Each and every one of us would come back from this.

By the time that my tune finished, the entire hospital was in tears. So was Velvet. The unburned side of her face pressed into the chest armor. My arm wrapped around her shoulders. A lumped formed in my stomach and throat. I was very glad that - despite the tears - my voice didn't crack on the song. Velvet was still sobbing softly as I tightened my grip on her slightly. I pushed her face back into her hair. Her mother thanked me - commenting that I would have made a good mother - as I stood back up.

Her mother had been forced to pull her away from me. She didn't want to let go of me. I didn't really want to let go of her either. I would have held onto her forever if I could. But I had to keep moving. So I continued slowly maneuvering through the close crowds of the hospital. I was almost to the other end when I spotted someone out of the corner of my eyes that I knew. There was a man and a woman. They were just a little older. They were also with a little girl. They were watching me very closely.

That was when I realized where I knew them from. They were Jason's family. My feet instantly carried me over towards them. "I'm so sorry," I whispered, coming to stand in front of them.

The family stood in front of me. Once more, the hospital had gone silent. No one knew how the family would react to seeing me again. Not when the last time that I had seen them had been on the Victory Tour. After I had attempted to rip out their son's vocal chords. After Cato had jammed a sword through his stomach to save my life. Were they any happier with me? Were they even angrier? I couldn't tell. I just saw that my guards were suddenly standing a little closer.

Clearly Jason's family noticed too. I raised a hand to get them to back away. This was between the four of us. Not them. Jason's mother was limping badly. It looked like she might have had a broken leg. Jason's father had a few bandages on his neck and chest. It looked like he had gotten hit by a flying object. Jason's sister was relatively healthy-looking. But she definitely looked like she hadn't had a meal in the past few weeks. Months. Ever. It would change. I was positive that it would change.

"You didn't kill him," Jason's mother said tearfully. She walked up and grabbed my hands. I let her, tightening my grip around her fingers. "Neither did Cato. Snow killed him."

I found myself slowly nodding. "Will you end this?" Jason's father asked.

"I won't stop until it's over," I said honestly.

"Thank you," Jason's mother sobbed.

She let up on her grip slightly. I let our hands fall apart as I turned back to leave. Before I could, Jason's sister reached up and grabbed onto my arm. "My brother was a good man," she whispered.

"I believe that," I told her.

"Remember that. Please," his sister begged.

"I will," I said.

We were all good children. Children... turned into weapons and pawns of the Capitol. Not a single one of us had been bad people. We were all good people who had been forced back into a corner. None of us had really wanted to do what we had been forced to do. It was now that I was finally realizing it. Even the Careers. The people that I had once hated. Even they hadn't really wanted to do what they had done. Cato had been proof enough of that.

Tears building in my eyes - memories of those kids and the Games resurfacing - I continued on my way through the hospital. Now I was slowly heading back towards the front. I was almost grateful to be gone. I wasn't sure how much longer I would manage in here anyways. I knew that from time to time a tear would slip out. It didn't matter. Someone new was always there to wipe it away and reassure me that they had the upmost faith in my ability. More faith than I did.

A new sensation began to germinate inside me as I walked back. But it took until I was standing up on a table, waving my final goodbyes to the hoarse chanting of my name, to define it. Power. I had a kind of power that I never knew I possessed. Snow knew it, as soon as I held out those knives. Plutarch knew when he rescued me from the arena. And Coin knew now. So much so that she must publicly remind her people that I was not the one in control.

But I was. There would be no more of me being everyone's puppet. I would do whatever they wanted me to do publicly. But no more of someone else pulling the string. The games might have finally shifted in my favor. These people were willing to follow one person. Me. They wouldn't condemn me for doing anything possible to save Cato. They wouldn't condemn me for doing whatever it took to be the one to ensure that Snow never took another breath. Not even if meant burning the Capitol to the ground.

A ferocity that I hadn't felt in a long time was burning through my core as I hopped down from the table and made my way back outside. My hands were shaking and my legs were burning with the desire to sprint ten miles, but I managed to restrain myself. Although when we were outside again, I leaned against the warehouse, catching my breath, accepting the canteen of water from Boggs. No matter how motivated I was, that had been emotionally and mentally taxing.

"You did great," Boggs said.

Was that supposed to be great? There really wasn't that much that I had done. I had managed to say a few nice words to the people. They had mostly led the conversations. I had showed them that I wasn't really dead and that I was able to move. I had even sang them a nice little song. But that was about it. Well, I didn't faint or throw up or run out screaming. So that was a plus. Mostly, I just rode the wave of emotion rolling through the place.

"We got some nice stuff in there. That song was beautiful," Cressida said.

"Thank you," I said.

"What song was that?" Katniss asked.

"Dad taught me," I explained.

"When?" Katniss asked curiously.

She must have been a little upset that he had never taught it to her. "When you were little. Too young to come out into the woods," I said, hoping that she wasn't hurt by it.

"It was beautiful. They loved it," Dean said.

"Which one was he?" Gale asked, coming to my side.

"What?" I asked blankly.

"The one whose parents you apologized to," Gale clarified.

Tribute. He meant Tribute. "Jason. The one who... The one who told me that he would bring my carcass to Cato, or give it to Prim to mount me over her bed," I said, shivering at the memory.

"Why would you apologize?" Gale asked.

My head snapped over to him. "Because I helped kill their son," I snapped.

"He hurt you," Gale reasoned.

And I ripped out his vocal chords for it. I think that we're even. "So?" I asked sharply. Gale just stared at me. "We all tried to hurt each other. We all turned into people who we aren't."

To my surprise, Gale backed down. "Sorry," he muttered.

"I know," I whispered.

Having never been in the arena, he would never know just how insane it made you. How desperate it made you. The things that it made you do. I looked at one of my insect cameramen, perspiration pouring from under his equipment. It was definitely hot out here. With all of the equipment on them now, I couldn't tell which one was Pollux and which one was Castor. Off to my other side, Messalla was scribbling notes. I had forgotten they were even filming me just a few seconds in.

"I didn't do much, really. For the cameras," I said, breaking the tense silence.

"You have to give yourself some credit for what you've done in the past," Boggs said.

That's a good joke. What I've done in the past? What had I done? Nothing good. That wasn't me. I was always doing something moronic. Getting Leah killed with the martial law in District 2, causing the District 12 firebombs, and the destruction happening all over the Districts. It was bad enough in just the little bit of District 8 that I had seen. All of those dead fighting for me, going all the way back to the Victory Tour. The trail of destruction in my wake - my knees weakened and I slid down to a sitting position.

"That's a mixed bag," I finally said.

"Well, you're not perfect by a long shot. But times being what they are, you'll have to do," Boggs said.

He was honest. Just like Gale. Maybe that was why I was liking him. Gale squatted down beside me, shaking his head. "I can't believe you let all those people touch you. I kept expecting you to make a break for the door," he said.

"Shut up," I said with a laugh.

Katniss walked up to the two of us and gave us her hands. We were likely getting evacuated soon. No need to linger in a war zone. "Your mother's going to be very proud when she sees the footage," Gale said.

"My mother won't even notice me. She'll be too appalled by the conditions in there." I turned to Boggs and asked, "Is it like this in every District?"

"Yes. Most are under attack. We're trying to get in aid wherever we can, but it's not enough," Boggs said.

"Will this play in the Districts?" Gale asked.

"It'll be tattooed on their eyes," Cressida said.

So Thirteen knew about all of this... They would see it soon, even if they didn't really know about it. "Why doesn't Thirteen take some of the worse off?" I asked Boggs.

"Too crowded as is," he said shortly.

There was something hesitant in his eyes that told me that he wasn't telling me the entire story. There had to be something more than that. Before I got the chance to say anything more - and before Boggs got a chance to defend his point of view - he stopped a minute, distracted by something in his earpiece. The rest of us stopped with him. I realized that I hadn't heard Haymitch's voice once, and fiddled with mine, wondering if it was broken. There was no way that he would have left me alone this long.

"We're to get to the airstrip. Immediately," Boggs said, pulling me forward with one hand. "There's a problem."

"What kind of problem?" Gale asked.

"Incoming bombers from the north. We need to find cover now," Boggs said.

Bombers? Hadn't they thought that this was going to be a relatively peaceful visit since there had already been an attack today? Why weren't they focused on the other Districts right now? That was when it hit me. The attack hadn't been premeditated. There was no way. I refused to believe it. I had to have been spotted. Snow was sending them after me. Boggs reached behind my neck and yanked Cinna's helmet up onto my head.

"Let's move!" Boggs yelled.

"There's a bunker in there," Paylor said.

My stomach felt like someone had dropped a ton of lead in it. The bombers were coming here for another round. This time it was all because I had brought them of. Whoever died today was on me. Instantly heading off in the direction that Paylor was pointing, I allowed my feet to drag me away from the sound of the engines. They would be approaching fast. Paylor was the only person to lead us out of the open air as a loud alarm began to blare. A warning to prepare for the bombs.

Paylor and I led the team into a building with a large chunk blown out of it. "Straight ahead and down the stairs," Paylor called.

Unsure of what exactly was going on, I took off running along the front of the warehouse, heading for the alley that led to the airstrip. But I didn't sense any immediate threat. The sky was an empty, cloudless blue. The street was clear except for the people hauling the wounded to the hospital. There was no enemy and the alarm had briefly stopped. Then even louder sirens began to wail. Within seconds, a low-flying V-shaped formation of Capitol hoverplanes appeared above us, and the bombs began to fall.

That was what the new sirens were for. A severe emergency alarm. I had no time to ponder it. I was blown off my feet, into the front wall of the warehouse. There was a searing pain just above the back of my right knee. Something had struck my back as well, but didn't seem to have penetrated my vest. Shrapnel. Probably. There was a good chance that a bullet had ricocheted and struck me. I had been hurt before. I could push past this. Especially right now. This was not where I was going to die.

Not before I killed Snow. We were too our in the open here. I had to get up and try to move into somewhere a little more covered. But the bomb had destroyed the far corner of the building that we were trying to get into. I tried to get up, but Boggs pushed me back down, shielding my body with his own. Everyone was going to do everything that they could to protect the Mockingjay. The ground rippled under me as bomb after bomb dropped from the planes and detonated.

How many more people were dying right now? Were any of my friends dead? I wanted to scream for them, but I couldn't force the words out of my throat. And what if the Capitol heard? They would come back just for them, knowing what their deaths would do to me. What about Skye, Dean, and Julie? I couldn't let Carrie lose her husband and Marley her father. No more Hadley deaths. But I couldn't move, and even if I could, Boggs would have never let me up.

Flames and dirt were spraying up all around us, many coming very close to hitting us. It reminded me of the firestorm from my first trip into the arena. Everything was coming so close. The bombs were so close to hitting us. I could feel the heat from them and my head was throbbing with the concussions of the blasts. When were they going to stop? When the hell was the wave of bombs going to stop so that we could get up and run off? Somewhere reasonably safe. Safer than in the empty alley.

It was a horrifying sensation being pinned against the wall as the bombs rained down around us. What was that expression that Mr. Everdeen had used for easy kills? Like shooting fish in a barrel. We were the fish, the street was the barrel. There was nothing that I could do until the bombs subsided. My heart was pounding in my chest as I thought about how I could get away from where we were. But there was nothing. It was better to pretend to be a corpse. They wouldn't target us if we looked like them.

"Aspen!" I was startled by Haymitch's voice in my ear.

"What? Yes, what? I'm here!" I answered.

"Listen to me. We can't land during the bombing, but it's imperative you're not spotted," Haymitch said.

"So they don't know I'm here?" I asked.

"Intelligence thinks no. That this raid was already scheduled," Haymitch said.

There was no way. They had to have known that I was here. This was too targeted. The timing perfectly right. Those bombs dropped just inches from where we had been standing. They had to have known that I was here. There were cameras everywhere after all. I had assumed, as usual, that it was my presence that brought on punishment. Now Plutarch's voice was coming up, calm but forceful. The voice of a Head Gamemaker who was used to calling the shots under pressure.

"There's a light blue warehouse three down from you. It has a bunker in the far north corner. Can you get there?" Plutarch asked.

"We'll do our best," Boggs said.

"Aspen, stay low. Move quickly. Do not stray from your guard," Seneca ordered in my ear.

Another voice of a Head Gamemaker who knew how to make decisions in the heat of the moment. I had ensured that one. There they all were. Ordering me around just like it was the good old days. But at least this time it was to keep me alive. Plutarch and Seneca must have been in everyone's ear, because my bodyguards and crew were getting up. My head was still spinning slightly but my eyes instinctively searched for Gale, Katniss, Skye, Julie, and Dean.

The ground was still shaking slightly from the impacts of the bombs. But the first wave had clearly passed by now. We had enough time to get to somewhere that was relatively safe. To my complete pleasure, it looked like no one had been hurt in the bombing. Not severely, anyways. It looked like I might have actually been the only one who was hit. Of course. Gale was on his feet, helping Katniss to hers, apparently both unharmed. Dean was helping Skye and Julie back to their feet.

"You've got maybe forty-five seconds to the next wave," Plutarch said.

So I was right. The first wave had already passed. It meant that we had to move before the next wave came through. I had a feeling that those wouldn't miss if we were still out in the open. I gave a grunt of pain as my right leg took the weight of my body, but I kept moving. I had dealt with this kind of pain before. Like after the poison fog. I could manage running from bombs with only a little bullet wound or something like that. There was no time to examine the injury. Better not to look now, anyway.

Fortunately, I had on shoes that Cinna designed. They gripped the asphalt on contact and sprang free of it on release. I was even faster than usual, despite the injury. I'd have been hopeless in that ill-fitting pair that Thirteen had assigned to me. Boggs had the lead, but no one else passed me on Seneca's order. Instead they matched my pace, protecting my sides and my back. I forced myself into a sprint as the seconds ticked away. We passed the second gray warehouse and ran along a dirt brown building.

It was only so long before the bombs started to rain again. Forty-five seconds. I was counting down in my head but that only made things worse. So I sped up slightly. I was moving faster than I had initially thought that I could. Clearly I had surprised the others. I feared having Katniss and Gale protecting me - as I wanted to be the ones to protect them - but I couldn't fight this one. They were going to give their own lives to protect mine. No matter what.

Up ahead, I saw a faded blue facade. Home of the bunker. We had just reached another alley, needed only to cross it to arrive at the door, when the next wave of bombs began. Just mere seconds before I reached the forty-five second mark in my head. I instinctively dived into the alley and rolled toward the blue wall. This time it was Gale who threw himself over me to provide one more layer of protection from the bombing. I wanted him off. Not protecting me. Protecting himself.

It was worse this time with Gale on me. Boggs was nice, but I didn't care that much if a bomb fell on him. It was Gale that I cared about. Who I loved. Who meant so much to me. His body was locked tensely over mine. His torso positioned over my neck and head, protecting my vital spots. His arms were locked around my waist, keeping me from shifting with the blasts. My entire body was trembling as more and more bombs fell. It seemed to go on longer this time, but we were farther away.

They had attacked the same spot that we were at just moments beforehand. By the time that it had ended, I shifted onto my side and found myself looking directly into Gale's eyes. For an instant the world receded and there was just his flushed face, his pulse visible at his temple, his lips slightly parted as he tried to catch his breath. He's still alive... My gaze turned to the side to ensure that the others were still alive, which they were. Boggs was protecting Katniss as Dean was protecting Skye and Julie.

"You all right?" Gale asked, his words nearly drowned out by an explosion.

"Yeah. I don't think they've seen me. I mean, they're not following us," I answered.

"No, they've targeted something else," Gale said.

"I know, but there's nothing back there but -"

My stomach started to churn as I realized what was happening right now. They weren't just attacking random spots throughout the City Center as I had originally thought. Not just because they realized that most of the people were there. They knew where everyone was hiding out. They knew where most of the weakest people would be gathered. All together. All unable to evacuate or fight back against the raid. The realization hit us at the same time.

"The hospital," I whispered desperately.

Instantly, Gale was up and shouting to the others. "They're targeting the hospital!" Gale yelled.

"Not your problem. Get to the bunker," Plutarch said firmly.

"But there's nothing there but the wounded!" I said.

"Aspen." I heard the warning note in Haymitch's voice and knew what was coming. "Don't you even think about -!"

As per usual, Haymitch was going to give some type of advice that would probably save my life while I did something that would likely get me killed. But this was something that I had to do. I couldn't get all of those people killed. Not all of those people who were going to die if we weren't fast enough. Not Jason's family, Velvet, Eddy, his sisters, and all the rest of them. I yanked the earpiece free and let it hang from its wire. With that distraction gone, I heard another sound.

This time it was something even worse. It sounded like there were people actually fighting back. I could hear gunfire that sounded like it was fighting back against the bombing. I sprinted away from the rest of the team - all of whom followed me - and into the building. No one sounded happy with me but I didn't care. I was about to head towards where Paylor was pointing us when I heard even more gunfire. They were close. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned towards it, sprinting off.

"Aspen!" Gale yelled. We were in some type of factory so I was winding in and out of all of the rows of textile production machinery. "Aspen!"

"Aspen, get back here!" Katniss screamed.

"Antaeus! Antaeus!" Boggs howled.

No matter how much they wanted me to stop, I didn't care. I had to see what was happening. I had to help stop this before it started. Before it got worse. Machine gun fire was coming from the roof of the dirt brown warehouse across the alley. Someone was returning fire. The rebels, I supposed. Before anyone could stop me, I made a dash for an access ladder that was across the street. I had to wait for them to stop firing before running for it. But I could make it. Climbing. One of the things I did best.

"Don't stop!" I heard Gale say behind me.

At least there was someone following me. Someone else was going to get in trouble for this. Gale and Katniss were both running after me, as I should have expected earlier. Not far from them, I could hear even more shuffling. Maybe there was a chance that someone else had tried to run after me. Then there was the sound of Gale's boot on someone's face. If it belonged to Boggs, Gale was going to pay for it dearly later on. But it was too late. Right now it was all about the fight.

My feet kept getting caught up on everything that had been toppled over during the bombings, but I refused to stop. I had to keep moving. I could get to the shooters within a matter of seconds if I could find a break. Finally I found a hole that had been blasted in the side of the wall by an earlier bombing. I dropped behind the side of the stone wall that remained and watched as soldiers crossed in front of me. Two soldiers were hiding behind a truck, exchanging fire with the bombers.

"Gale, back away from the wall!" Boggs shouted.

That was when it dawned on me. Not only could we see the shooters, so could the Capitol bombers. It happened just as Katniss and Gale arrived at my sides. Dean, Skye, and Julie were just behind us. Boggs was still trying to approach us. But it was too late. I heard the massive roar of a bomber engine before spotting the shadow of it on a tank across the street from us. Suddenly there was a massive explosion just feet away - outside of the building - as we were all thrown back.

We all hit the floor on our sides. Katniss was turned towards me with her arms thrown over my head. Gale had an arm wrapped around my midsection to keep me against him. The moment that he recovered - which was just before Katniss or I could manage to recover - Gale weakly stumbled to his hands and knees and covered the two of us with himself. Even now, he was going to refuse to let something happen to us. Even if it meant giving his own life.

The air was dusty with dirt and rocks and smoke blowing everywhere. It was hard to see but I could spot Julie, Skye, and Dean - who were a little ways back from the blast - running over to check if we were alright. My ears were badly ringing, just the way that they did after I blew up the Career supplies during the first Games. Eventually the Capitol ear recovered some sense of hearing as Gale peeled himself off of us, allowing us to slowly get back to our feet. At least, if another explosion didn't happen.

"You okay?" Gale asked, his voice slightly muffled.

"Come on! Come on! We gotta go. Now," Dean yelled.

I was still a little dazed, down on my hands and knees. "Gimme, Aspen. I got her," Skye said.

My head was spinning. The concussion certainly wasn't helping with all of the bangs and explosions from the gunfire and bombs. It was never going to go away at this rate. I managed to pull myself to my feet with Skye and Gale's help, leaving Dean and Julie to help Katniss to her feet. I shook off their extra offers of help. I could manage. Boggs was approaching us again, his voice slightly muffled. But it was something else that alerted me to another problem. A frighteningly large cracking noise.

What the hell was that? "Move!" Boggs shouted.

We all turned back just in time to see that it was a pillar from one of the textile factories - towering at least a hundred feet in the air - that had been cracked down the middle. As it crashed through the building towards us, Gale grabbed onto me and Katniss, shoving the two of us just behind Dean, Skye, and Julie. We managed to outrun the collapsing pillar by just a few feet, only glancing back for a moment to see that it had cut off the others from reaching us.

My feet were still propelling me forward as I ran to the next opening in the building to watch the other firebombers fly around the building. We hesitated for just a moment to see what was happening. I was the first one to peek my head out, followed by Katniss, and then by Gale. I hung around the corner, just in case another fleet was coming. The other three were on the other side of the wall. As I looked up into the sky, I saw two more bombers heading off into the distance.

"They're going after something to the south," Dean shouted.

Gale and I exchanged a glance. "We were right. It's towards the hospital." Just as I said it, two more bombers flew past us. I moved carefully to the other side of the wall with the others. "They're circling back around. Come on!" I called.

Without giving them a chance to say anything back to me, I darted out into the open. Someone was sure to spot me - as my Mockingjay costume was pretty easy to differentiate from the other soldiers - but I didn't care. I knew that Haymitch and Seneca and everyone else back in District 13 were going to be furious with me for what I had done. But right now I really didn't care. Like they had said, I was hotheaded. I reacted to things, not people. Like right now.

This was something that I had to do. I had to save those people back in the hospital. The ones who believed in me. So I sprinted off towards the building just across the street from where we were. Gunfire was being exchanged loudly as I sprinted for my life across the rubble and towards the outdoor stairwell in the other building. Dean, Skye, and Julie were running just behind us. Even with the searing pain in my leg, I pushed past it and jumped three stairs in my plight towards the roof.

The roof access was almost six floors up and my leg was throbbing, screaming for me to stop by the time that we turned over the last landing and emerged on the roof. The moment that we hit the landing for the roof a bomber flew low over us. The gunfire really wasn't doing that much to them. I heard the bullet ricocheting from the guns mounted underneath the bombers hitting the metal railing for the staircase just inches in front of where I was standing.

Fearing getting hit again, I ducked down behind some sandbags that were exploding from the bullet hits. Gale, Katniss, and the others were all ducked down behind us. Gale's hands were at the tops of my thighs. I knew that he was just trying to urge me forward. So I stood back upright and ran past the body of a soldier who had been hit by the gunfire. They were already dead. No help would be of any use to them. As I straightened up, I followed the bomber with my eyes to see what was happening.

It was way too far away for me to make an accurate shot from here. No one could. But I realized that it was circling around where the hospital was. It had clearly just dropped one from the black smoke that was billowing from the top of the building. It wasn't the hospital. At least, I didn't think that it was. I was pretty sure that it was the warehouse that we had hidden behind when the first wave had struck. Good thing that we weren't still there.

Fearing the worst, I crossed to the other side of the roof, the others tailing me closely. I was watching the bomber fly off, hoping it would come close enough so that I could make a shot. But to my surprise, just as we were heading out from behind what had once been a window of an upper floor, another bomber flew straight above us, firing down at the rooftop mere inches from where we were standing. I just barely managed to step back and knock Katniss and Gale away from the bullets as it flew overhead.

We were all down, crouched into fetal position, waiting for the air to clear. Dirt and dust and small rocks were raining down on us as the hovercraft flew out of firing range. Had they still not spotted me? Or were they more concerned with everything else? Breathing heavily, holding onto Katniss and Gale for dear life, I heard another loud crack. I raised my head out of Gale's shoulder to see another large explosion going off in the distance.

"That's the hospital. They're targeting the hospital," I said, horrified.

Getting to my feet, I went back to my previous plan. Make it as high up onto the roof as I could and try to make a shot from there. I headed off towards a service ladder that would let us out on the last remaining bit of the real roof. It looked like the rebels had made a pitch up there anyways. Ignoring the searing pain that was shooting through my shin, I made the climb as quickly and safely as possible. I made the roof after almost fifteen seconds and dragged myself onto the tar.

Hesitating long enough, I leaned down to help pull Gale and Katniss up beside me. Dean managed to get up without anyone's help, motioning for the three of us to head off while he helped Skye and Julie up onto the roof. Once we were all back on our feet, we then took off for the row of machine gun nests on the street side of the warehouse. Each looked to be manned by a few rebels. We skidded into a nest with a pair of soldiers, hunching down behind the barrier.

"Boggs know you're up here?"

To my left I spotted Paylor behind one of the guns, looking at us quizzically. So that was where she had gotten off to. I had noticed that she was gone back when we had still been inside of the warehouse with the others. I had thought that she'd went to save herself. Maybe I liked Paylor a little more than I had originally thought that I did. But what could I say to her about what we had done? I tried to be evasive without flat-out lying.

"He knows where we are, all right," I said.

Paylor laughed. "I bet he does. You been trained in these?" She slapped the stock of her gun.

"I have. In Thirteen. But I'd rather use my own weapons," Gale said.

"Yes, we've got our bows." I held mine up, then realized how decorative it must have seemed. So did Katniss's and Gale's. "It's more deadly than it looks," I promised.

I had ended up taking a few people's lives with the one that Katniss was using, after all. "It would have to be. What about you three?" Paylor asked Dean, Skye, and Julie.

"We're good," Dean said.

"All right. We expect at least three more waves. They have to drop their sight shields before they release the bombs. That's our chance. Stay low!" Paylor called.

Everything that I was used to shooting was much slower than one of the Capitol hoverplanes. They were damned fast. I would have to learn to compensate for that. It also didn't help that they were pretty high in the air. Much higher than most birds would fly. Plus I was used to killing something with... skin. I knew where the vital spots on humans and animals were. But as for planes... Maybe the underbelly of it. The cockpit. The wings. I positioned myself to shoot from one knee.

"Better start with fire," Gale said.

He was right about that. Katniss came down onto her knee at my side. Gale took the other side. Dean, Skye, and Julie were back a little further into the nest with their rifles propped up on the edge of the building. I nodded at Gale and pulled an arrow from my right sheath. So did they. If we missed our targets, the incendiary arrows would land somewhere - probably the warehouses across the street. A fire could be put out, but the damage an explosive could do may have been irreparable.

We were much better off with using the flames. Although I wasn't sure how well that form of shooting would do. The explosive arrows would work a little bit better, but we couldn't risk accidentally blowing up the hospital. If it was already standing, we had to defend it. Suddenly, the hoverplanes appeared in the sky, two blocks down, maybe a hundred yards above us. Much further than most birds that I had ever shot before. There were seven small bombers in a V formation.

"Geese!" I yelled at Gale and Katniss.

The others were staring at us like we had lost our minds. Not that it really mattered. Right now all that mattered was taking down the bombers. We could take them all out if we were fast enough. It was a call that I knew that Gale and Katniss would already know. They would know exactly what I meant. During migration season, when we hunted fowl, we had developed a system of dividing the birds so that we didn't both target the same ones.

It was easy enough with three people. I would take the far side of the V, Gale would take the near, and Katniss would take the front bird, working back and alternating shots. There was no time for further discussion. I estimated the lead time on the hoverplanes and hesitated to see just how fast they were really going. I pulled back the arrow into the string and watched, my arrowhead slowly moving upwards to follow the planes.

Katniss let her arrow go, just barely clipping the wing of the second plane on the right side. It went down slowly and awkwardly. At least it went down. She had underestimated how fast they were. Taking a few deep breaths, I let my arrow fly. I managed to catch the inside wing of one, causing it to burst into flames instantly. Gale just missed the point plane. A fire bloomed on an empty warehouse roof across from us where his arrow hit. He swore under his breath.

The hoverplane that I managed to hit swerved out of formation, but still released its bombs. Both of the planes that Katniss and I shot down reappeared in the sky. They were flying slowly and awkwardly. There was a good chance that they wouldn't fly for much longer, but they would for a little while. Long enough to drop another wave. The plane that I hit didn't disappear. Neither did the other one that I assumed was hit by gunfire. The damage must have prevented the sight shield from reactivating.

"Good shot," Gale said.

"I wasn't even aiming for that one," I muttered. I had set my sights on the plane in front of it at the point of the formation. "They're faster than we think."

"Positions!" Paylor shouted.

How the hell had that happened? I had thought that the planes were supposed to come in waves almost a minute apart? Had a minute already passed? Maybe it was because time seemed to slow down in the middle of a battle. Or maybe it was because I had spent a long time trying to track the hoverplanes. Not that it had really worked out that well. While I was pondering what was happening, the next wave of hoverplanes was appearing already.

"Fire's no good," Gale said.

Once more, he was right. I just had to pray that I wasn't going to miss. Hitting one of the buildings would likely cause an even bigger problem than the bombs. Plus it would have come from me. I nodded at Gale and we both loaded explosive-tipped arrows, Katniss following a second later. The good thing was that those warehouses across the way looked deserted anyway. As the planes swept silently in, the engines still quiet, I made another stupid decision.

"I'm standing!" I shouted to Gale and Katniss.

Without letting them get the chance to argue against it, I rose to my feet. That was the position that I got the best accuracy from. Katniss and Gale followed to their feet a moment later. We were the only ones who were standing. I lead earlier and moved my arrow up into the sky. Higher and sooner. That was when I needed to fire. So I pulled back the arrow on the string and released it. Thankfully I scored a direct hit on the point plane, blasting a hole in its belly. I grinned proudly. Finally. A direct hit.

At least the few weeks without practice hadn't really affected me. Gale blew the tail off a second. It flipped over itself and crashed into the street, setting off a series of explosions as its cargo went off. A moment later, Katniss blasted off the right wing of another one of the bombers. All three of us grinned at each other. We were the only ones to really manage to take down the hoverplanes so far. It was mostly because the bombs in the arrowheads were the only things that really worked against them.

Without warning, a third V formation unveiled itself. We got no chance to really rearrange ourselves. It was fire on instinct or miss the wave. That time, Gale squarely hit the point plane. Katniss took the wing off the second bomber, causing it to spin into the one behind it. Together they collided into the roof of the warehouse across from the hospital. A fourth went down from gunfire. My arrow managed to split off the cockpit of the fifth, taking it down instantly, skidding into the street, erupting into flames.

Some bombs went off, but they weren't quite as bad as they would have been if they were dropped. Turning to the side, I saw that two more bombers managed to break away. The ones that we hadn't taken down. They were splitting off and coming back around from behind us. Probably trying to take our shooters - including me - out. They were heading right towards us. I immediately ripped an explosive arrow out of my sheath, Katniss and Gale following suit, heading to the other side of the roof with me.

The others were firing at the wings as the three of us make an attempt for the cockpits. As they approached, making a full circle around the building and heading back to us, everyone began firing. On our side and theirs. The bombers were firing straight at us. Katniss, Gale, and me. The bullets were shattering into the ground in front of where we were standing, getting closer and closer. I finally released just as the bullets were hitting the wall in front of us, offering only some protection.

My arrow connected with the rightmost bomber cockpit, hitting dead center. It went down in a swirling pattern, taking the other down with it. Even though we had taken them down, there was a problem. They went straight towards the street with the hospital on it. I could see that it had already been hit. I just hoped that the people had gotten out. The bomber that I hit spun right into a warehouse, erupting in flames. The other clipped a pillar, which fell the opposite way of the warehouse that was now on fire.

"All right, that's it," Paylor said.

Did that really mean that it was over? We had finally hit the last of the waves? Four or so waves had passed during the time that we had been in District 8. How long had it been since the first bombing had started? Not even five minutes or so. That was how fast that it had ended. That was how fast so many lives had been claimed. Flames and heavy black smoke from the wreckage obscured our view, but I already knew what had happened.

"Did they hit the hospital?" I asked.

"Must have," Paylor said grimly.

No... They couldn't all be dead. I reached over and grabbed onto Katniss and Gale's shoulders, pulling them with me. I had to see it. I had to make sure that they were okay. As I hurried toward the ladders at the far end of the warehouse, the sight of Messalla and one of the insects emerging from behind an air duct surprised me. I would have thought that they would still be hunkered down in the alley. They might have had weapons, but they were a television crew. But maybe they were a little more.

"They're growing on me," Gale said.

Normally I would have smiled. But something else preoccupied my thoughts. So I scrambled down a ladder, ignoring the pain in my shins telling me to stop moving. When my feet finally hit the ground, I found a bodyguard, Cressida, and the other insect waiting. I expected resistance, someone shouting at me for what I had done, but Cressida just waved me toward the hospital. Which was exactly where everyone had been planning on me running off to.

Cressida was yelling, "I don't care, Plutarch! Just give me five more minutes!"

In the back of my mind, I knew what was happening. She wanted me to see the destruction of what I could assume she already knew had been left in the wake of the hospital. She was probably trying to get a reaction out of me. But I couldn't care right now. I just had to see them. Velvet, Eddy, and Jason's family. All of those people. They couldn't all be dead. Not one to question a free pass for something that I needed to do, I took off into the street at full speed.

"Oh, no," I whispered as I caught sight of the hospital.

Actually, it was what used to be the hospital. I moved past the wounded, past the burning plane wrecks, fixated on the disaster ahead of me. People screaming, running about frantically, but unable to help. The bombs had collapsed the hospital roof and set the building on fire, effectively trapping the patients within. A group of rescuers had assembled, trying to clear a path to the inside. But I already knew what they would find. If the crushing debris and the flames didn't get them, the smoke did.

Having already lived through two firestorms in both of the Games, I knew what was happening. I knew the pain that they were going through. And I couldn't let someone die like that. I could push through there. I could get to them. Even if I could only help one person, I had to do something. Gale and Katniss were at my shoulders. The fact that they did nothing only confirmed my suspicions. Miners didn't abandon an accident until it was hopeless. Katniss was already crying, trying to fight to get to them.

She, like me, was still trying to get to them, no matter what. "Help them! Help them! Get them out!" I cried loudly.

As everyone stood around, watching the burning remains of the hospital, I wound in and out with Katniss to get to them. The two of us nodded at each other. We had to help. I jumped over burning pieces of debris and was just yards away when Gale's arm latched around my waist. He had one cementing Katniss in her place and the other around me, keeping us from getting any closer to the hospital. Cressida was shooting footage as I watched the hospital burn in horror. I couldn't do anything...

They had attacked them... Innocent people... "Come on, Aspen. Haymitch says they can get a hovercraft in for us now," Gale was telling me.

It wasn't just me. It didn't seem that Katniss could make herself move either. The two of us just stared at the burning hospital. They had done this. They had really killed all of these innocent people. Why the hell had they done that? Tears were rushing to my eyes. There were hundreds of people in there who were now dead. Because of me. I refused to believe what they had said. This attack had to have been ordered when those in the Capitol had seen me here. It had to have happened that way.

"Why would they do that? Why would they target people who were already dying?" I asked him.

"Scare others off. Prevent the wounded from seeking help. Those people you met, they were expendable. To Snow, anyway. If the Capitol wins, what will it do with a bunch of damaged slaves?" Gale suggested.

In the back of my mind, I remembered all of those years in the woods, listening to Gale rant against the Capitol. Me, never paying close attention. Wondering why he even bothered to dissect its motives. Why thinking like our enemy would ever matter. Clearly, it could have mattered today. When Gale questioned the existence of the hospital, he was not thinking of disease, but this. Because he never underestimated the cruelty of those we faced.

He was right. As he so usually was. They had done this all to hurt me. To inflict maximum damage with minimal causalities on their side. They had done this, knowing that I would see it. They knew that I would be watching. They knew that I would be standing only feet away from the hospital when it happened. I slowly turned my back to the hospital and found Cressida still right there, flanked by the insects, standing a couple of yards in front of me. Her manner was unrattled. Cool even.

"Aspen. President Snow just had them air the bombing live. Then he made an appearance to say that this was his way of sending a message to the rebels. What about you? Would you like to tell the rebels anything?" Cressida prompted.

Was there something that I wanted to tell them? There were so many things that I wanted to tell them that I couldn't even think about it right now. All of my thoughts were jumbled together right now. I was still too busy seeing what had happened right in front of me. I just stared at the burning hospital for a long time. Was there a chance that this had actually been a previously scheduled air strike? It could have been. Everyone seemed to think that it had been.

But I knew that the Capitol spared no cruelty. Especially when I came into the picture. They would always be as cruel as possible when it came to me and hurting me. This attack hadn't been previously scheduled, no matter what anyone had said. They knew that I was here. Someone had to have seen it on security footage. They knew that I was in District 8 and they destroyed the hospital because of it. Right in front of me. Like Gale said, eliminate faulty workers and hurt me in the process. Win-win for them.

Then another thought occurred to me. Why hadn't they blown up the hospital while I had been inside of it? They could have killed me. That was when I realized something else. Snow never wanted me to just be hurt instantly. He wanted to drag it out. He wanted to drag my misery out. There was a reason that they had waited so long to destroy the hospital. They waited so that I would get out of sight of the hospital so that they would only murder the innocents in there.

They did it so that they could show everyone what would happen if they ever brought me in. Sheltered me. Fought for me. What any association with me would cause for them. Also just to hurt me. Just to give me another thing to feel so horribly guilty about. I started trembling with a mixture of fear, anger, and heartbreak. They were purposely showing everyone else that I would be unharmed, but anyone that dared ally themselves with me would die. In the most painful way possible.

The worst part was that these people hadn't been expecting to have to defend themselves. Not at the time of the attack. Those weren't people who had been able to defend themselves. They had all been injured. Badly. It showed that not even the soldiers who allied themselves with me would be killed. It was everyone. Even the kids who were too young to fight. To even be in the Games. Anyone who showed faith in me would be killed. I remembered Snow's haunting words from his broadcast.

The criminals that kneel before you use symbols for the purpose of sedition. Which is why all images of The Mockingjay are now forbidden. Possessing them will be considered treason. Punishable by death. Justice shall be served swiftly. Order shall be restored. To those who ignore the warnings of history, prepare to pay the ultimate price.

Yes. I knew exactly what I was supposed to do right now. It was something that Snow had been forced to show me. He wanted me to play the game. He would draw the game out in the worst way possible. He would show me what the ultimate price was. Time and time again until this was finally over. Horror and agony over what had happened to the hospital had turned into an anger and unstoppable rage. So I straightened up. What did I want to say?

"Yes," I whispered.

Despite the previous deafening roar of flames and bullets, it now seemed almost silent in the area. It seemed like the entire world had done silent to listen to what I had to say. What did I want to say? Something that would burn Snow to the core. Something that would let him know that he hadn't destroyed me. Not yet. Not ever. The red blinking light on one of the cameras caught my eye. I knew that I was being recorded. This would eventually get to Snow.

"Yes," I said more forcefully.

Everyone was drawing away from me - Gale, Katniss, Dean, Julie, Skye, Cressida, the insects - giving me the stage. I could see that Katniss was still crying. Gale had an arm wrapped around her shoulder to keep her from bolting towards the burning hospital. Even as everyone else backed away, I forced myself to stay alone in the broken street. It wasn't as hard as it normally was to stay in the spotlight. Not with words bubbling up in my throat. I stayed focused on the red light.

Cressida pointed me to the camera on one of the insect's helmets. "I want the rebels to know that I am alive. That I'm right here in District Eight, where the Capitol just bombed a hospital full of unarmed men, women, and children! There will be no survivors!"

My voice was cracking on the last few words. I didn't bother to stop it. The people would understand how I was feeling right now. It would make everything sound more realistic. Just like the not-so-pretty rendition of Deep in the Meadow that I had done for Rue when she died. This would feel real. Not staged. The shock that I had been feeling of the deaths of all of those people who had been rooting for me began to give way to fury.

"If you think for one second that the Capitol will ever treat us fairly if there's a cease-fire, you are lying yourself! Because you know who they are and what they do!"

Tears were lingering on the edge of my eyelids. They would fall at any second. But I couldn't care about that right now. Snow had to know that I wasn't gone yet. I wasn't even close to being done. And the people had to know that this wasn't going to get better. The only way for this to get better was for us to win. We had to win. My hands went out to the sides automatically, as if to indicate the whole horror of the scene around me.

"This is who they are! This is what they do! And we must fight back!"

My hand was motioning back towards the destroyed hospital. They had to see what had happened. They had to see what was going to keep happening, no matter what. I was picturing all of those starving children on Ms. Everdeen's table. The whippings that Rue mentioned. My own starvation. The desperation in the eyes of the children at the Reaping every year. The Hunger Games and reign of the Capitol was over. I would never see those again. I was moving in toward the camera now, carried forward by my rage.

"President Snow says he's sending us a message? Well, I have a message for President Snow." I looked directly into the camera, sending him a subliminal message. It's just you and me. This is for you. "You can torture us and bomb us and burn our Districts to the ground, but do you see that?"

A moment later I turned to the other insect. His camera was right in my face, only a few inches separating the two of us. My hand went backwards for him to follow. He instantly realized what I was doing as his camera followed. Just a moment later the lens of the camera focused on one of the planes burning on the roof of the warehouse across from us. The Capitol seal on a wing - charred by my explosive arrow - glowed clearly through the flames.

"Fire is catching!"

My voice was so loud that it was painful to crack. The smoke and flames were filling my lungs. But I refused to stop. Snow needed to know just how serious I was. The rest of the people needed to know that I was on their side. Now and forever. I was shouting now, determined that he would not miss a word.

"And if we burn, you burn with us!"

My last few words were more of a snarl than anything else. Afterwards my last words hung in the air. I felt suspended in time. Held aloft in a cloud of heat that generated not from my surroundings, but from my own being. But the despair of what I was feeling took over. I turned back to the burning hospital, cameras still focused on me, dropping to my knees and allowing myself the moment to cry. My gaze locked on the hospital, I continued to watch it slowly burn, leaving nothing remaining.

"Cut!"

Cressida's voice snapped me back to reality and extinguished me. Although I was still in reality. This part wasn't going away. It wasn't ever going to go away. Hundreds of lives had been lost today. All so that I could give a damn speech. Cressida and her team were good people, but their Capitol personalities were showing. For them, this had been my test as an actor. For me, this was a moment of shock. Enough to wake me up to what I would truly need to do to end this war. Cressida gave me a nod of approval.

"That's a wrap."

Chapter 9: Chapter Nine

My entire body was numb. My mind even felt a little numb. Not just from the concussion. Boggs suddenly appeared at my side. I didn't even bother looking up at him. He got a firm lock on my arm, but I wasn't planning on running now. I didn't even think that I could manage getting to my feet. I looked over at the hospital - just in time to see the rest of the structure give way - and any remaining fight went out of me. All those people, the hundreds of wounded, the relatives, the medics from Thirteen, were no more.

All of those people who had loved and cared for me were dead. In the worst way possible. I knew what it felt like to have bones break as I was crushed. I knew what it was like to feel like your insides were being cooked. I was well-aware of what a burn felt like. My heart was slowly breaking at the sight of it all. All of those people who had spoken to me were now dead. There was no chance of survivors from that mess. Not now. Our only hope was that the propo would help the fight in the other Districts.

My words would start a fight. I was sure that they would. People would be horribly amazed at what the Capitol had done to Eight. I was sure that they would start fighting back, if they weren't already. I turned back to Boggs, my body slightly sore from all of the falls that I'd taken, and saw the swelling on his face left by Gale's boot. It had definitely been Boggs that Gale had kicked. I was no expert, but I was pretty sure that his nose was broken. His voice was more resigned than angry, though.

"Back to the landing strip."

Obviously he didn't like what had happened either. I had seen the stunned look on his face when I had been saying my words and when he had seen the wreckage. I obediently took a step forward and winced as I became aware of the pain behind my right knee. The adrenaline rush that overrode the sensation had passed and my body parts joined in a chorus of complaints. I was banged up and bloody and someone seemed to be hammering on my left temple from inside my skull.

Maybe the injuries weren't terrible - although I had a feeling that the one in my shin was actually a bad one - but something was definitely weighing down on me. Maybe it was the sight of the hospital now as a pile of rubble. Now that I saw just how bad things really were. My shin was throbbing as I tried to walk away from the hospital. My steps were almost impossible. I just couldn't manage to make myself walk off.

What had happened to me during the fight? I couldn't remember. I did remember getting injured during the initial blast and ignoring it. There was something lodged in the back of my shin. I could feel it moving around with each step that I took. My back was a little sore from what was likely a bullet wound - but the bullet hadn't pierced the vest. There was also a horrible spinning in my head. Maybe the concussion was getting worse again or maybe it was just from the exhaustion or overwhelming moments of panic.

My knees started to buckle slightly again. I wasn't sure that I could keep walking. Whether it was from the injuries or exhaustion, I wasn't quite sure. Boggs quickly examined my face, then scooped me up and jogged for the runway. I was glad that he had me in his arms and was strong enough to carry me. The others were jogging behind us. Halfway there, I puked on his bulletproof vest. It was hard to tell because he was short of breath, but I thought that he sighed.

There went the impression I made from the propo. "Sorry," I muttered.

"It's okay. Put this on your forehead," Boggs said.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw him reach down and grab something. I raised a brow when he handed me a small rag. For a moment I just stared at it, so he placed the rag down against my forehead. I hissed in pain slightly, realizing that there was blood there. It turned out that the side of my temple was cut open. Something had injured me. It was probably a piece of flying rock from one of the blasts. I tried to keep the rag there to mop up the excess blood.

Had I been bleeding for a long time? Was that why I felt so strange? Blood loss. I wasn't sure. I hadn't even felt whenever my temple had been sliced open. Although it just added to my injuries, I was sure that it would end up looking quite good in the propo. Proof that I was actually fighting back in this war. I wouldn't be made up. I would be dusty and dirty and bloody from the battle. I would look like a real soldier. Not the made-up one that Fulvia had originally wanted.

Finally Boggs stopped jogging and I instantly felt much better without the constant jostling. I was sure that I would be sick again at some point though. A small hovercraft, different from the one that transported us here, was waiting on the runway. The second that my entire team was on board, we took off. Likely before there could be another attack in Eight that we would be stuck in. There were no comfy seats and windows this time. We seemed to be in some sort of cargo craft.

It made sense. This was essentially an emergency evacuation. They would want me back in District 13, where it was safe and I wouldn't be injured any further. Boggs instantly started doing emergency first aid on people to hold them until we got back to Thirteen. I wanted to take off my vest, since I got a fair amount of vomit on it as well and it was slightly tight on my chest, but it was too cold to think about it. Instead I laid on the floor with my head in Gale's lap.

"You'll be alright," Gale said, running his fingers through my hair.

"Thanks for... for protecting me," I wheezed.

"Always, Aspen," Gale whispered.

"Hey, you're alright," Skye said, leaning over and pressing a hand against my arm. The uninjured one, which I really appreciated. Skye then looked at Boggs. "What's wrong with her?"

"Couple of things. Exhaustion. Blood loss. Concussion. Shock," Boggs said.

Definitely shock. That was all that I felt right now. "She'll be alright?" Julie asked.

"She'll be fine. She just needs rest," Boggs promised.

That was definitely something that I needed. It was just something that I could never get. Rest didn't seem to be something that I could get that easily. In the meantime, I could tell that everyone was kneeling down at my sides. Katniss looked like she got hit in the thigh and arm. I reached over to try and wrap a hand around her wrist. She had been injured. I didn't want her to be injured. Too many people had been injured because of me. She couldn't be on that list.

"You're hurt," I mumbled.

"I'm fine. You're hurt, but we're gonna take care of you," Katniss promised.

Judging by the sound of her voice, I could tell that Katniss was getting a little bit woozy too. The look of her wounds told me that she must have lost a lot of blood during the attack too. I assumed that she, like me, was probably suffering from shock of what had happened. It anyone else was really hurt by what had happened other than me, it would be Katniss. She didn't like watching people get hurt either. The two of us were both having a terrible time with this.

"Come on. Both of you, lay down. You don't look too good," Gale warned Katniss.

She didn't look good at all. She looked sick and like she was about to pass out. "Cat? Are you okay?" I asked.

"I'm fine," Katniss consoled me. "Are you?"

"I'll be okay," I muttered.

"Aspen... I'm sorry... We didn't know what was going to happen," Katniss muttered.

I couldn't figure out why she felt that it was her fault and she had to apologize. Of course, she, like me, always felt guilty about things that were out of her control. "I know. The hospital - How - How many people were in it?" I stuttered.

"It doesn't matter," Boggs said, instantly alerting me to the fact that there had been a lot of people in that hospital. "They're going to pick up and move on. Just get some rest."

"Hey... It's okay. You did well out there," Gale said, brushing my hair back.

"They were attacked," I muttered.

"That attack was premeditated. It's not your fault," Dean said.

At least he didn't look injured. "They knew that I was there. They waited until I left to start dropping the bombs to show them what would happen to them if they allied with me," I said.

"They didn't, Aspen. They didn't know that you were there," Julie said, cradling her foot.

"We'd have a bomber after us right now if they knew that you were in it. The sky's clear right now," Skye pointed out.

She was right about that. But... they had to have known that I was here. "Does anyone have water?" I asked.

Gale reached down and pulled out a canteen of water. "Here. Take as much as you need. Slow sips," Gale warned.

"Thanks." I tilted the canteen back and took a long drink of water, against Gale's advice, drinking until I had almost drained the entire thing. "I'm gonna be sick," I muttered.

"Close your eyes. We'll be there soon," Gale said.

"They - They..."

My thought was never finished. I didn't instantly pass out. I was just unable to speak any longer. I was unable to keep talking. I didn't know what to say or how to say it. My head was spinning rapidly and the ceiling of the hovercraft seemed to have been undulating. I could feel myself getting extremely exhausted as the moments passed. The adrenaline had completely left my system. The last thing that I remembered was Boggs spreading a couple of burlap sacks over me.

Things were very fuzzy in my mind when my eyes slowly pried themselves open. I wasn't quite sure what had happened to me. All I knew was that I still felt like I was going to be sick. I wasn't sure where I was at first. Nothing looked familiar. Then I realized where I was and why my head was spinning. I was high up in a tree. Confused as to how I got up there and where I was, I stood from my crouched position and hopped down. I hit the grass just moments before someone appeared from around the corner.

"How are you feeling?"

My head was spinning even more right now. Because I knew exactly who was standing in front of me. One of my best friends in the world and the most important people to me. I just wished that he was still really here. Not around to only appear when I had been injured and needed so desperately for someone to speak to me. Peeta was standing just a few feet away from me. I so desperately wanted to go and hug him, but I was still unsure if I could walk without falling.

"Terrible. I got shot," I finally said.

"You didn't get shot. You caught a bit of shrapnel in the back of the calf. You'll be fine. You've had worse," Peeta said.

"I suppose."

"You look good."

"No, I don't. But thank you anyways."

"You're welcome. You do look good. You look like a soldier. You've actually been shot and you have a bloody head. It'll look good in those propos."

"Once they get over the fact that a hospital full of innocent people was blown up."

Peeta shook his head and started circling me. "Those people were fighting for you. It's okay. You made the Capitol look like the villains. They'll know that the Capitol was at fault for what happened," Peeta said.

"But they were still killed because of me," I growled.

"They were killed because the Capitol has no limits to its cruelty. You know that."

"I guess I do know that."

"You're going to be okay, Aspen."

"I used to tell myself that all the time. But now I'm not so sure."

"I promise that you're going to be okay," Peeta said.

"What about after all this? What happens then?" I asked.

"You forget. You try and move on."

Forgetting everything that had happened... That went back to the day that I was born. I wanted to forget all of that. "I don't want to forget everything. I don't want to forget you," I said honestly.

There were others that I wanted to remember. Rue, Wiress, Finch, Thresh, and Cecilia. Many others. "Seems to me like you're not forgetting me anytime soon," Peeta said teasingly.

"No. I suppose that's true. You stick with me. Usually in the worst of times."

"You're trying to cope with what's happened. You imagine me whenever you can't handle what's happening in your life. I take you back to a simpler time."

"Making sure my family wouldn't starve," I said slowly.

Peeta smiled. "Yes."

"I never thanked you for that."

"I always knew."

"But I should have said something a long time ago. I should have told you that you were the reason that I lived through that winter. The reason that I made it here. Started all of this," I said, waving around us.

Peeta shook his head, taking my hand and having me walk with him. "This was always going to happen," Peeta said.

"Johanna said that once," I reasoned.

"She was right. We were always going to end up here. Aspen, this might be a nightmare right now, but you're going to save thousands of families from losing their children to the Hunger Games."

"Instead they'll lose their children to the rebellion," I said gloomily.

"Better a good cause than something worthless," Peeta said.

My head snapped over to him. He was right about that. He had always been right. I knew that people were dying for something good. But that didn't change the fact that I didn't want anyone to die. But he was saying the truth. These people were dying for something that was worth it. It just didn't change the guilt that I carried with me. I shifted awkwardly in the middle of the woods before noticing that I wasn't wearing the Mockingjay costume. I was back in my original Tribute outfit.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"You know where we are," Peeta said.

Of course. We were back in the original arena. "I hate this place," I growled.

"So do I," Peeta said.

There was no way that he actually ended up here. "This is where you're resting?" I asked.

"No. I thought you needed to see it again."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Say that this war never started... Say that the Hunger Games continued," Peeta said. I nodded blankly at him. "Not counting the Third Quarter Quell, think about the next few years. If the Hundredth Hunger Games still only had twenty-four Tributes, if every subsequent year only had one Victor, it would be another five hundred and seventy-five dead kids. For nothing."

"Thousands are dying now," I pointed out.

"For something important. To ensure that no one else ever dies somewhere like this again."

"I don't want anyone else to die at all. Except for maybe Snow."

"Still determined to get to him?"

"Yes."

"Be careful out there, Aspen. You're very reckless," Peeta said, not completely unkindly.

"You know what, I am reckless," I admitted.

"It was one of the things that I always liked about you. I think that it's one of the reasons that Cato was so attracted to you in the first place."

"That sounds about right." The two of us stared at each other for a moment. "I miss you."

"I miss you too, Aspen. But I'll see you again one day."

"Yes. You will."

That would be a good day. I wanted to see Peeta again. Not in a stress-induced hallucination. "Not for a long time, okay?" Peeta added.

"I'll try my hardest. But people don't seem to like me too much."

"But you are very hard to kill."

"So it seems." No matter how hard people tried, I never died. Even when I wanted to. "What am I going to do, Peeta?"

"You're going to fight. You're going to be the Mockingjay. You're going to win this war and move forward with your life. Then you get to settle down. With Cato. Go and live somewhere. Forget about the rest of the world. Get to have the family that you've never had," Peeta said.

"I'm going to try," I whispered.

A family... An actual life... It seemed almost impossible. "You'll succeed." Peeta glanced up and smiled. "I think it's time for you to go back now. They need you," Peeta said.

"They need me too much."

"Unfortunately. I'll come back and visit soon."

"I wish you could always be here," I said sadly.

"I am. Right here."

Peeta moved in towards me just slightly closer. He extended his hand and patted me very softly over the heart. I wasn't in pain like I had been before. I smiled softly at the sight of him. At the feel of him again. The world began to spin very slightly as Peeta finally released me. Then it got faster. It felt just like the spinning Cornucopia from back in the Quarter Quell. Clearly the head trauma was really affecting me from the constant impacts of the bombings earlier.

When I really woke up - not in the arena or with Peeta at my side - I was warm and patched up in my old bed in the hospital. Of course I had somehow ended up here. I seemed to always be here. They might as well have given me my own wing. As I glanced around I realized that Peeta really wasn't here. They had taken care of me the moment that we had gotten back to Thirteen. Peeta had only been a dream. Ms. Everdeen was there, checking my vital signs. She didn't even look at me.

"How do you feel?" Ms. Everdeen asked.

"A little beat-up, but all right," I said.

"No one even told us you were going until you were gone."

Had I really not told anyone? I tried to think back to... yesterday, I was guessing. Of course. I hadn't even thought to say anything to my family. Katniss and I had just left. Without saying anything... To Prim or Ms. Everdeen. I hadn't said anything to Cato's family either and I was relatively sure that Dean, Skye, and Julie hadn't said anything. I felt a pang of guilt. When your family has had to send you off twice to the Hunger Games, that really wasn't the kind of detail you should overlook.

"I'm sorry. They weren't expecting the attack. I was just supposed to be visiting the patients," I explained. "Next time, I'll have them clear it with you."

"Aspen, no one clears anything with me," Ms. Everdeen said.

My stomach lurched painfully again. She was right. When had I ever cleared anything with her? Not the day that I had moved into the little shack that had once been my parents'. Not anything that had happened since going into the Games. Not my engagement or wedding in the Capitol. Not that those were really my choice. But it didn't matter. What she had said was completely true. I was particularly the case. I never cleared things with her. No one did. Not since Mr. Everdeen died. Why pretend?

"Well, I'll have them... notify you anyway," I said awkwardly. One of these days I would have to speak to her about what had happened after Mr. Everdeen's death. "How's Katniss?"

"She's fine. She was cleared to leave earlier," Ms. Everdeen said.

"What happened to her?" I asked.

"Piece of shrapnel in her arm and thigh. She's a little sore but she's fine."

It was her doctor's voice. She was cold, but it was just because Katniss was healthy. "Anyone else hurt?" I asked.

"Skye was cut up in the face by a few rocks during one of the explosions and Julie broke a toe during a fall. They'll both be okay."

That was a slightly larger injury than I had been expecting. "What about Julie's foot?"

"She'll be able to walk on it faster than you think."

"As for Dean?"

"He's fine. Tired, but fine."

At least someone had gotten out of this thing without being injured. "Good," I muttered dumbly. "Sorry we didn't tell you. I didn't think about it."

"It's okay, Aspen. I'm just glad that the two of you are okay," Ms. Everdeen said.

"We are too."

We were deeply glad that we were okay. Things could have been very bad if someone had been seriously injured or killed. On the bedside table was a piece of shrapnel they removed from my leg. My head was patched up from whatever had sliced it open. The doctors were more concerned with the damage that my brain might have suffered from the explosions, since my concussion hadn't fully healed to begin with. But I didn't have double vision or anything and I could think clearly enough.

Not that I really wanted to be thinking right now. Every time I started thinking, I would make myself upset about everything that I had been through. It turned out that I was right about having not been awake since yesterday. I had slept right through the late afternoon and night, and I was starving now that I was awake. But my breakfast was disappointingly small. Just a few cubes of bread soaking in warm milk. It reminded me of food for a prisoner. Which, in my own way, I was.

It took a long time for me to be released from the hospital. It didn't really bother me. I knew that they would want to talk about what had happened in Eight once I was released, and I didn't want to face that. So I spoke to the doctors and only complained minimally when they poked and prodded me. They kept asking me about what was happening and how I was feeling. They had me play their old game again, which was fine, since I was actually feeling a tiny bit better. About Cato. Not what happened in Eight.

Unfortunately I could only delay the inevitable for so long. I had been called down to an early morning meeting at Command. I started to get up and then realized that they planned to roll my hospital bed directly there. I wanted to walk, but that was out, so I negotiated my way into a wheelchair. I was not getting wheeled in there. I felt fine, really. Except for my head, and my leg, and the soreness from the bruises, and the nausea that hit a couple minutes after I ate. Maybe the wheelchair was a good idea.

It didn't stop me from insisting a few times that I could walk. Although once I fell - hurting my tailbone in the process - I finally conceded to the wheelchair. I had been called to the Collective before the meeting in Command. I was a little embarrassed to have to be wheeled in after such an 'impressive' performance in District 8, but I figured that falling on my ass again would be even more embarrassing. I would just keep my injured leg turned towards the people who were staring.

Of course, that was everyone, as it usually was. Now they were even more interested in what was happening with me. They all knew that the first real propo had been filmed. I knew that Coin was planning on showing all of the footage that they took back in Eight to the people of Thirteen. It had to have been before they had done any editing to it. They hadn't had time. Did they? It had to have just been something to show the people so that they knew that I was really doing something out there.

The man who had been pushing my wheelchair moved me up to the same perch that I normally stood on whenever Coin made some big announcement - with the exception of when I had asked for Cato's immunity. I watched in stone silence as the people of Thirteen filled into every empty space of the Collective. Coin quickly joined me with some others. The crowd down below almost immediately quieted to see why they had all been called to gather here.

At first Coin made some introductory remarks. Like usual, she was never one to waste words. She talked about how I had been sent to District 8 to rally the troops so that they could start making propos. She then continued with how the attack went awry, telling the lie that Boggs must have fed her about how we hadn't run off. I simply listened, never faltering in my face, even when she told a lie. I assumed that she either didn't know or didn't want to tell them the truth of what had really happened.

After all, she wouldn't care how Boggs had broken his nose. He didn't have to tell her that Gale had done it. Finally the footage was played. It started with the moment that I saw the burning hospital. Cressida's voice had been edited out. But I could see myself running to it, Gale catching me around the waist, keeping me back from it. Then Cressida asked what I was seeing. The cameras panned back to show only me. The crowd was deathly silent as they waited for me to start speaking.

Even now I could feel the anticipation burning in the air. None of them had seen it. But they did want to see what their Mockingjay could really do. Instantly my words started to play. I could hear the hisses of discontent as I explained what had happened. I could hear the waver in my voice as I commented that there would be no survivors. I got to my feet and watched the screen wearily. The doctor was standing with the wheelchair close behind me, but I had no intention of falling.

"Because you know who they are and what they do! This is who they are! This is what they do! And we must fight back!" I shouted on the screen.

Instantly I looked away. Looking at myself onscreen had never been something that I liked. Not even after the Games with Cato, when they had played the recap. What was really interesting was seeing myself the way that I was. I had seen myself react harshly and without thinking before. After Rue's death, when Prim was Reaped, before the Death Match, both of my individual training routines, and a few other times. But I had never been quite that angry or severe before. It almost scared me.

"You can torture us and bomb us and burn our Districts to the ground," I continued.

"Plutarch and Seneca's faith in you wasn't misplaced," Coin said, standing at my shoulder.

I looked over at her. "Thank you."

"I can see why they're so fond of you," Coin continued.

What the hell was that supposed to mean? It had to mean something. But what? Coin was still watching me closely, so I just nodded blankly, unsure if I was really supposed to say anything else back to her. I certainly couldn't think or anything else that I should say. It was another one of her hints to me that made me think that maybe there was a chance that Coin knew about my past with Seneca. So I merely looked back at the screen and tried not to make a face.

"But do you see that? Fire is catching," I continued on the screen.

"Come up with me for the beginning," Coin said.

That would be wonderful. Standing up there so that the rest of the District could see me. They would know that I was uncomfortable with all of the attention the moment that they saw me. And I didn't want that. I was supposed to be the strong Mockingjay that they had designated me as. The footage was still rolling in the background as we walked up towards the stand that Coin would make her announcements on. The doctor from the hospital was still following me closely with the wheelchair.

"And if we burn, you burn with us!" I shouted on the screen.

On the screen it cut to my final shot on the hovercraft that was heading straight to the hospital. Not that it mattered. It was still too late. I hadn't realized that anyone had been standing that close to see my shot. At the end of the propo, when the hovercraft burst into flames, the emblem of a burning Mockingjay took over with the words 'Join The Mockingjay' across it. The four-note whistle Rue taught me back in the first Games sounded before the words 'Join The Fight' flashed across.

There was a loud drum-like beat with the video as it finally came to an end. The audience almost immediately burst into applause like I had never heard before. Even more than every other applause that I had heard them give combined. It was very strange but somewhat encouraging. Although I did find myself nervous as I stood at Coin's side. I was very woozy from what had happened, but I knew that I had to push through it. I had to be around when Coin addressed everyone else.

"There is no progress without compromise; no victory without sacrifice. But I stand here with the Mockingjay to announce that our moment has arrived," Coin announced.

As the 'Join the Fight' logo was still smeared across the screens with the burning Mockingjay in the background, Coin reached over and grabbed my hand. I was almost surprised when she did the same thing that Caesar Flickerman had once done. She grabbed my hair and raised it into the air. Of course, Peeta had once done it too. It only helped confuse my feelings about Coin. Once Coin released my hand, I turned back and headed to stand with my propo team again, placing myself next to Finnick.

"Beetee has increased our use of the airwaves tenfold. We will broadcast this message to all the Districts tonight. The Mockingjay's words inspiring everyone to join the rebellion. Together we will become an alliance to be reckoned with," Coin continued.

To my right, Prim, Katniss, and Ms. Everdeen were watching Coin closely. None of them seemed to even be blinking. Not that I could have been surprised. They hadn't seen this yet. Boggs, Beetee, and Gale were across the platform from us. They were all watching with soldier's stances. It was almost strange to see Gale that way. I wished that we could be back that day of the Reaping that had sent me into the first Games. Laughing and having as much fun as we could possibly have.

"Hoorah! Hoorah! Hoorah! Hoorah! Hoorah!" the crowd chanted.

It was the happiest that I had ever seen anyone in District 13, which wasn't a very happy place. I was instantly uncomfortable with all of the applause and cheers for me. Because I didn't deserve them. My words had been thought out and would definitely end up making an impact somewhere. We had gotten some really good footage to show to the Districts too. But how many people had ended up losing their lives to make that happen?

"You don't like hearing a fight song at a funeral, huh?" Finnick asked, leaning over.

"Good analogy," I said lowly.

"The more people on our side, the closer we are to Cato and Annie," Finnick pointed out.

"Yeah," I said blankly, looking back out into the crowd.

"You okay?" Finnick asked.

"Not overly-fond of what happened out there."

"Looked bad."

"It was."

"You gave them hope."

"Before I killed them," I said hopelessly.

Finnick laid a hand on my shoulder. "It wasn't you. It was a premeditated strike. And even if it wasn't... you can't do that to yourself. You can't take the weight of all of these people on your shoulders," Finnick said.

"Well I have the weight of the rebellion on them. Why should this be any different?" I asked.

Finnick and I stared at each other for a moment before his wrist started beeping. He turned over his communicuff and nodded at me. "Come on. They want to see us in Command. They're showing the finished product," Finnick said.

"This isn't the finished product?" I asked, pointing to the screen.

"It's the shortened one. There's another - more impressive - one that'll air through the Districts first. Messalla is finishing up on it now," Finnick explained.

"Okay. Let's go."

Patting Prim on the shoulder and smiling at Ms. Everdeen, Finnick and I headed off with everyone else. As much as I would have loved to prove myself and walk to Command, I was ordered by the doctor to use the wheelchair. I felt rather stupid being wheeled around, but I knew that arguing with them wouldn't work. I was lucky that I was in the wheelchair and not the bed. So I just let Finnick walk at my side and tried to ignore the smiles that were being sent my way. Because of what I did. For those dead people...

In the back of my mind, I couldn't help but to wonder what Cato would think of the propo film if he ever got the chance to see it. He would, at least, when he got to Thirteen. But I wanted to know if he would be proud of me? He had always known that I was strong. He had always known that I was brave. He would likely be impressed and think that it was amazing of me to do what I had done. And he would know just what to say to console me about the hospital.

For right now, I just had to wait patiently for Cato's rescue and go about my own business as the Mockingjay. Right now, we were heading towards Command. I wasn't really sure what they wanted me there for. Coin had already shown the footage to everyone and it had gone over swimmingly. Now I just wanted to go back to bed. I wasn't really interested in what people thought about me or my performance. I just wanted to go to bed and take a nap. Maybe for the next year.

As they wheeled me down the hallways, I began to get uneasy about what I would face. Gale, Katniss, and I directly disobeyed orders yesterday, and Boggs had the injury to prove it. So did Dean, Skye, and Julie, now that I thought about it. They had followed us, after all. Surely, there would be repercussions, but would they go so far as Coin annulling our agreement for the Victors' immunity? Had I stripped Cato of what little protection I could give him?

My stomach was suddenly threatening to empty the remains of the tiny breakfast from the morning. I was going to be sick. I was sure of it. How could I have been so thoughtless with my actions yesterday? I had been in the zone. That was why. I had reverted to my age-old react before I got the chance to realize what I was doing routine. But had I essentially doomed Cato for just a moment of heroism? Maybe the cubes of bread in milk was a good idea, after all.

When I got to Command, the only ones who had arrived were Cressida, Messalla, and the insects. Messalla beamed and said, "There's our little star!"

The others were smiling so genuinely that I couldn't help but smile in return. "Thanks," I said softly.

The people whom I'd thought were just Capitol citizens pretending to be rebels had impressed me in Eight, following me onto the roof during the bombing, making Plutarch back off so they could get the footage they wanted. They more than did their work, they took pride in it. Like Cinna. They were right to be happy. They were the only reason that people even knew what had happened. I had a strange thought that if we were in the arena together, I would pick them as allies. Cressida, Messalla, Pollux, and Castor.

"I have to stop calling you 'the insects,'" I blurted out to the cameramen. They were back in their domed cameras. "Which one of you is which? I can't tell when you're like that."

Immediately feeling very rude for what I had said, I launched into the explanation of how I did know their names, but their suits suggested the shelled creatures. The comparison didn't seem to bother them. They actually thought that it was rather funny. I also commented about how I couldn't tell which one of them were which whenever they were with their cameras, so I referred to them as a collective unit. Standing side-by-side without the cameras, I noticed how strongly they resembled each other.

Same sandy hair, red beards, and blue eyes. They looked just alike. I had a feeling that Castor was slightly older. As I walked around them, I noticed that Castor had close-bitten nails. It was a little hard for me to not look over Pollux and see the Avox in him. It was the position of his lips and the extra effort he took to swallow - I would have known if they hadn't told me that he was an Avox. I so desperately wanted to know what he had done, but I knew that was far too rude to say.

They had cut out his tongue and he would never speak again. That was why he had been signing yesterday. The thing that I had been so determined to learn. I still wanted to learn so that we could talk to each other and not through someone else. I wanted to know if Pollux knew Darius, Clio, or Lavinia, but I knew that it would have been wrong of me to ask. But I really did want to know. At least I no longer had to wonder what made him risk everything to help bring down the Capitol.

We were sitting together at the table for a few minutes when Seneca entered the room. More and more people were slowly flooding the room, but Seneca was the first one to take a seat beside me. It was something that I appreciated. I noticed that a few people were sending the two of us long looks. They would always be surprised that I could get along with Seneca after everything that he had done to me. If only they knew the entire truth... But now I actually enjoyed having Seneca with me.

"What's happening now?" I asked, knowing that he would know.

"We'll be observing your footage," Seneca explained.

"Didn't we already watch this?" I groaned.

"They want to discuss it away from the rest of the people."

"Haven't I done enough for them?"

"Quiet," Seneca hissed. "How's the leg?"

"Fine," I lied, despite the constant throbbing that was going through the back of my calf. "They keep putting me in the wheelchair."

I had refused to sit in it for the meeting. Instead I was sitting at a chair with the wheelchair behind me. "They're concerned about the concussion. All of those explosions that you faced in Eight didn't help," Seneca explained.

"Well I'm alive. I suppose that I don't have much to complain about," I muttered.

"I'm sorry about the hospital," Seneca said.

"Was it premeditated?" I asked suddenly.

I had to know. I had to know if they had planned it. "What?" Seneca asked.

Swallowing a lump in my throat, I tried to force out the words. "The attack on the hospital. Was it premeditated? Or did they attack it because I was there?" I asked slowly.

Seneca let out a slow breath before placing a hand on my knee, not putting too much pressure on it. "We still believe that they were intending to attack the hospital again. However it's a great coincidence that the attack would happen just after you set foot in District 8 and the hovercrafts had evacuated, unable to safely retrieve you," Seneca reasoned.

"I thought so."

"We didn't know that they were planning that."

"I believe you. Was it worth it?"

"That might be an answer that you don't want to hear. Remember, Aspen, I was a Head Gamemaker. I think of the greater picture, not the individual wins and losses. For me, this was a win," Seneca explained.

That was it. That was when I saw just who Seneca Crane really was. He was a good man. I genuinely believed that. The only problem was that he was still a Gamemaker and still from the Capitol. He would never really care about the little losses like the hospital. And that was what it was. Those were all injured people. They weren't fighters or useful with their injuries. As much as I liked Seneca these days, I still had to remember just how different the two of us were.

"Thank you for telling me the truth," I finally said.

"You're welcome," Seneca said softly.

As the room filled with others, I braced myself for a less congenial reception. But the only people who registered any kind of negativity were Haymitch, who was always out of sorts, and a sour-faced Fulvia Cardew. Boggs wore a flesh-colored plastic mask from his upper lip to his brow - I was right about the broken nose - so his expression was hard to read. Coin and Gale were in the midst of some exchange that seemed positively chummy.

Most of the people in the building seemed very happy to see us. All of Cato's family were seated at the table across from me. Even Carrie was here today, which was odd, considering she usually wasn't present at our meetings. But I quickly realized why. Dean must have taken a hard fall at some point. It looked like he was limping and Carrie had been helping him here. Damien and Alana were seated next to each other. Skye looked pretty banged up and Julie seemed to be cradling her foot.

As usual, Aidan and Marley weren't present. I had a feeling that someone was taking care of them. Even Felix and Marcus were here. I smiled at them as they sat with the Hadley's. Finnick was two down from me and I glanced past him to see someone else who was only present about half of the time. Brutus was actually here. I knew that he regularly worked with the rebels but he normally avoided the meetings. He didn't like talking things out, unless it was to continuously insult me.

When Gale slid into the open seat on my other side, I said, "Making new friends?"

His eyes flickered to the president and back. "Well, one of us has to be accessible."

"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked sharply.

"You know exactly what I mean," Gale said slowly.

"I guess so," I growled, rolling my eyes.

A moment later, Katniss dropped onto our other side. She didn't speak at first. She simply sidled into the chair and rolled her wrists. I could see that she was tired. She had dark bruises underneath her eyes. She must have been having nightmares about the hospital burning down - just the way that I had. I looked at her and gave a weak smile. She grinned weakly back at me before looking down at the table and not saying another word. Not to me or Gale.

Gale touched my temple gently. "How do you feel?"

Twitching slightly, Gale instantly released me. Whatever he had done when he had touched me, it had caused some issue. Now my head was spinning and I was sure that I was going to be sick all over again. They must have served stewed garlic and squash for the breakfast vegetable. The more people who gathered, the stronger the fumes were. It was horrible. At least Boggs was on the other end of the room today. My stomach turned and the lights suddenly seemed too bright.

"Kind of rocky. How are you?" I asked.

"Fine. They dug out a couple of pieces of shrapnel. No big deal," Gale said.

"Me too," I said, about the shrapnel.

"I know. I visited you," Gale said.

"You didn't have to."

But Gale would have always come to check on me. Just the way that I would have checked on Gale if it had happened to him. "I know. Just wanted to see how you were," Gale said.

"Thank you," I said softly.

"You okay?" Gale asked.

"I don't like watching the footage," I said.

"Why? You did wonderfully," Gale said.

My jaws tightened slightly. "Because I see the bodies of five hundred people burning behind me. That's what it took to bring that out of me. I don't know if it's worth it," I said slowly.

"If it helps us win the war?" Gale asked.

"That's not the way that I wanted to win," I said.

"It's war, Aspen. There's no room for chivalry."

"I know. I was in the Hunger Games. Remember?"

The two of us stared at each other for a moment. Gale looked like he was about ready to yell at me. Instead, he just said, "Trust me, I've never forgotten."

We stared at each other until Coin called the meeting to order. "Our Airtime Assault has officially launched. For any of you who missed yesterday's twenty-hundred broadcast of our first propo - or the seventeen reruns Beetee has managed to air since - we will begin by replaying it," Coin said.

Replaying it? They had already managed to run it through the Districts? I had thought that they just finished it. I didn't think that they had managed to send it out to the Districts yet. It turned out that they had managed to get usable footage, place it in more than one propo film, and they had already managed to air it repeatedly after slapping multiple ones together. My palms grew moist in anticipation of seeing myself once again on television.

"Didn't we just watch it?" I asked.

Coin's head turned towards me slowly. "That is a shortened version. We're showing the full version," Coin explained.

"Oh... Okay," I muttered dumbly.

It really wasn't something that I wanted to see again. What if they were using a different piece of my performance for this propo? What if I was still awful? What if I was as stiff and pointless as I was in the studio and they had just given up on getting anything better? I knew that the other one they had shot was good, but I definitely doubted my own abilities as a speaker. Individual screens slid up from the table, the lights dimmed slightly, and a hush fell over the room.

At first, my screen was black. I stared at it blankly. Then a tiny spark flickered in the center. It blossomed, spread, silently eating up the blackness until the entire frame was ablaze with a fire so real and intense, I imagined that I felt the heat emanating from it. It reminded me of the way that Cinna had made my Quarter Quell Tribute Parade costume. The image of my Mockingjay pin emerged, glowing red-gold. The deep, resonant voice that haunted my dreams began to speak.

Claudius Templesmith, the official announcer of the Hunger Games, said, "Aspen Antaeus, the girl who was on fire, burns on."

My head snapped even closer towards the screen. It was Claudius Templesmith. He had always seemed like such a Capitol man. There was no way that he was on our side. Was he? He had always seemed to love the Games so much. He had to have been angry about all of this. There was no way that he was working for the rebels. Was there? Suddenly I was distracted, because there I was, replacing the Mockingjay, standing before the real flames and smoke of District 8.

"I want the rebels to know that I am alive. That I'm right here in District Eight, where the Capitol just bombed a hospital full of unarmed men, women, and children! There will be no survivors!"

They hadn't done anything to my voice, which I was somewhat happy about. My voice had been wavering and choking slightly from the smoke, but my words were easy enough to understand. It helped show that I was really there. Really hurting, along with the rest of District 8. The screen cut to the hospital collapsing in on itself, the desperation of the onlookers, my dash to help them with Gale catching me around the waist, as I continued in voice-over.

"If you think for one second that the Capitol will ever treat us fairly if there's a cease-fire, you are lying yourself! Because you know who they are and what they do!"

This was already much more impressive than the one that they had shown back in the Collective. This was something that might really encourage the fighting in the Districts who still weren't one hundred percent onboard with the whole rebellion thing. Maybe this would even convince the people in the Capitol. That was what I really wanted. The cameras were back to me now, with my hands lifting up to indicate the outrage around me.

"This is who they are! This is what they do! And we must fight back!"

Now came a truly fantastic montage of the battle. I really hadn't even noticed that they were filming during it. The initial bombs falling were first. I could see myself being covered before jumping up and moving on. Sprinting through the building. Barely missing the outdoor bomb and later the falling tower. I noticed that they cut out the portion where we made it clear that Gale, Katniss, Dean, Julie, and Skye had followed my movement to blatantly disregard orders and head up to the roof.

More than once, I saw us being blown to the ground. Even up on the roof when I had stopped us twice for getting into the firing range of the Capitol hoverplanes. At one point, there was a close-up of my wound, which looked good and bloody - scaling the roof, diving into the nests, and then some amazing shots of the rebels, Gale, Katniss, Julie, Skye, Dean, and mostly me, me, me knocking those planes out of the sky. The best one came at the very end, the last shot that I had made.

My arrow went straight up towards the sky. The music was playing heavily in the background, dramatic and increasing in pitch and volume. The bullets were coming closer to where Gale, Katniss, and I were standing. My arrow tipped upwards before I released it. The bullets were mere inches from my feet when I hit it. With a small explosion, the cameras followed the planes being knocked out of the sky - smashing into another pillar and an abandoned warehouse. Smash-cut back to me moving in on the camera.

"President Snow says he's sending us a message? Well, I have a message for President Snow. You can torture us and bomb us and burn our Districts to the ground, but do you see that?"

Now the cameras moved again. No more of my face, which I was happier about. But I did realize that we could see my wounds. Blood was running down the side of my head, mixing into my hair. It looked much better. We were now back with the camera, tracking to the planes burning on the roof of the warehouse. Tight in on the Capitol seal on a wing, which melted back into the image of my face, shouting at the president.

"Fire is catching! And if we burn, you burn with us!"

Flames engulfed the screen again. They mixed in on the flames with the Capitol hoverplane. I was glad that they didn't use the flames from the hospital. That was the last thing that I wanted them to use. The horror of what had happened to the hospital after the initial wave of bombs. Superimposed on the now burning black background, in black, solid letters were the words:

IF WE BURN
YOU BURN WITH US.

The music that was playing in the background hit a crescendo. It stayed that way for a few moments before the music finished its flourish. I knew that my face was slightly reddened from what I was seeing. It was one of the most impressive things that I had ever seen, and it wasn't even over yet. The words that had been on the screen caught fire and the whole screen burned to blackness before the propo clip finally ended.

There was a moment of silent relish, at which point I almost thought that I would get yelled at for a terrible performance, but then there was a round of applause followed by demands to see it again. Coin indulgently hit the replay button, and this time, since I knew what would happen, I tried to pretend that I was watching this on my television at home in the Seam. An anti-Capitol statement. There had never been anything like it on television. Not in my lifetime, anyway.

My stomach was churning in knots. I couldn't believe that the first time that there had ever been a statement like this made on national television, I was the star. All I had wanted was to go into the Hunger Games, win them, and become a mediocre Victor. Someone that had been good enough to win, but boring enough to never want to bother again. But that wasn't what had happened. I had merely lit a spark and ignited it with each one of my movements, even the ones that had been meant to quell it.

So many accidents that had happened because of me. All of this, because of me. As I stared at the screen, I tried to see that it was me on the screen. But I couldn't believe it. It didn't look like me. Either way, I was sure that nothing like this had ever been played before. Likely not even during the First Rebellion. It made me just the slightest bit hopeful that we might actually be able to win this war. Maybe in time, we would really be able to abolish the Hunger Games.

As the video continued to play, I looked around the table. They ended up playing the propo at least three times. It didn't bother me. At least I didn't have to speak while they played it. It just seemed that everyone was thrilled to see that I wasn't completely useless. I was also happy to see that I wasn't completely useless. Maybe I was in the studio, but not out there. I could work out there. It was an absolute nightmare, what had happened in District 8, but I knew that we had gotten vital footage.

My gaze slowly turned towards the other direction to see who might have looked a little upset. Not surprisingly at all, it was Katniss. She looked greatly disturbed by the footage. She was the only one. I glanced over and nodded at her. We had done the right thing. We both knew that. It might have been a nightmare being there, but it was the right thing to do. Katniss reached past Gale and grabbed my hand, squeezing it tightly. We would be okay. We both would.

The moment that I let go of Katniss's hand, I looked at everyone else. Gale was smiling. He looked over at me and nudged my shoulder. He was proud. I could tell. Cato's family also looked thrilled. Not at my injury, but at my performance. Although I realized that I had never said goodbye to them either. I didn't think to say goodbye to anyone. At least they looked extremely proud. Like they would have of their own child. Seneca turned towards me and nodded slowly, a small smile gracing his face.

By the time the screen burned to black a fifth time, I needed to know more. "Did it play all over Panem? Did they see it in the Capitol?" I asked.

"Not in the Capitol. We couldn't override their system, although Beetee's working on it. But in all the Districts. We even got it on in Two, which may be more valuable than the Capitol at this point in the game," Plutarch explained.

All of the Hadley's were nodding blankly. "That's good. Anything for them to realize that I'm trying to help them," I said.

"I'm working with Lyme -" Brutus started.

"The Victor?" I interrupted.

Brutus's head snapped over towards me. "Who else? Yes, the Victor," Brutus snapped. I rolled my eyes. "She's the lead of the rebel forces in District Two. I'm trying to work with her to enlarge the rebel forces out there."

"What about...?"

My voice dropped when I trailed off, realizing that I didn't know Skye's sister's name. I turned to look at her and realized with a jolt of horror that Skye was shaking her head. "No."

It wasn't the time to push her. So I tried to change the subject. "Is Claudius Templesmith with us?" I asked.

That gave Plutarch a good laugh. "Only his voice. But that's ours for the taking. We didn't even have to do any special editing. He said that actual line in your first Games," Plutarch said.

"When?" I asked curiously.

"When you survived the firestorm," Plutarch said.

"Did you send that after me?" I snapped.

"Is that really important right now?" Plutarch asked.

That was reasonably enough to tell me that Plutarch was the one who had sent the firestorm after me. It hadn't been Seneca. Plutarch had already been on the side of the rebels. Seneca had still been loyal to the Capitol. Of course, it made complete sense. Plutarch was a Head Gamemaker. He always had been. He had already known what would happen. Always playing three steps ahead of everyone else. Plutarch then slapped his hand on the table.

"What say we give another round of applause to Cressida, her amazing team, and, of course, our on-camera talent!" Plutarch cried, interrupting my train of thought.

Everyone burst out into a thunderous round of applause. I was clapping, too, until I realized that I was the on-camera talent and maybe it was obnoxious that I was applauding for myself, but no one was paying attention. Either way, I almost instantly stopped clapping. I couldn't help but to notice the strain on Fulvia's face, though. I thought about how hard it must have been for her, watching Haymitch's idea succeed under Cressida's direction, when Fulvia's studio approach was such a flop.

But they should have known. Anyone who knew me, knew that I wasn't good in front of cameras. Cato was the person who had made me look so impressive in front of the cameras. I was only good by myself when I ended up forgetting that cameras were there and what I was supposed to be doing. That was when I managed to make myself a little more impressive. The applause was still going when Coin seemed to have reached the end of her tolerance for self-congratulation.

"Yes, well deserved. The result is more than we had hoped for. But I do have to question the wide margin of risk that you were willing to operate within. I know the raid was unforeseen. However, given the circumstances, I think we should discuss the decision to send Aspen into actual combat," Coin said.

The decision? To send me into combat? My jaws flapped for a moment before I managed to stop myself. That would have been a terrible thing to say. She didn't know about what had happened out there. Not really. Boggs must have been keeping our secret. It would have been easy enough to just say that he took a nasty fall and broke his nose. Still, she didn't know that I flagrantly disregarded orders, ripped out my earpiece, and gave my bodyguards the slip? What else were they keeping from her?

"It was a tough call," Plutarch said, furrowing his brow. "But the general consensus was that we weren't going to get anything worth using if we locked her in a bunker somewhere every time a gun went off."

"And you're all right with that?" Coin asked.

Alright with being put in combat? I would have loved that, but, like usual, it wasn't my choice. It was never my choice. Everyone just determined what I was going to do and then let me know about it. I was used to it by now. It had been well over a year. Most of my life had been just like that. The table was oddly silent though. Maybe they hadn't come to a consensus about putting me in battle. But when Gale had to kick me under the table, I realized that she was actually talking to me.

"Oh! Yeah, I'm completely all right with that. It felt good. Doing something for a change," I said determinedly.

"Well, let's be just a little more judicious with her exposure. Especially now that the Capitol knows what she can do," Coin said.

There was a rumble of assent from around the table. I sat awkwardly back in my seat. I would have thought that I was used to it by now. I should have been used to all of the attention. But it wasn't something that I could get used to. I hated it. So I pulled at a few threads on the jumpsuit that I was wearing as people started chattering back and forth. Talking about me, what to do with me, how to best use me. But never involving me in the conversation.

"Didn't they already know?" I finally asked Seneca, referring to Coin's earlier statement.

Seneca shook his head. "A few misplaced arrows and knives are nothing compared to this. Not just the explosive arrows that Beetee designed. Your words. They know what their actions will inspire," he explained.

"Right," I said dumbly.

My thoughts were still on what had happened before. The fact that no one had ratted out Gale, Katniss, and me. Even Dean, Skye, and Julie's choices had been kept secret. It was probably a good thing. We would have been in a ton of trouble. But no one looked upset by the fact that we had ignored our warnings. Not Plutarch, whose authority we ignored. Not Boggs with his broken nose. Not the insects we led into fire. Not Haymitch - no, wait a minute.

Haymitch was giving me a deadly smile and saying sweetly, "Yeah, we wouldn't want to lose our little Mockingjay when she's finally begun to sing."

The look on his face was the same look that he had given me so many times before. The same look that I knew that he had given me when I had rushed into the Cornucopia, saved Cato in the Bloodbath, taken on Rue as an ally, managed to trap myself in a tree underneath the Careers, and so many other times. Yes, he wasn't happy with me at all. I made a note to myself not to end up alone in a room with him, because he was clearly having vengeful thoughts over that stupid earpiece.

"So, what else do you have planned?" Coin asked.

Plutarch nodded to Cressida, who consulted a clipboard. "We have some terrific footage of Aspen at the hospital in Eight. There should be another propo in that with the theme 'Because you know who they are and what they do.' We'll focus on Aspen interacting with the patients, particularly the children, the bombing of the hospital, and the wreckage. That song that you sang, too. That can probably play over the top of the interactions.

"Messalla's cutting that together. We're also thinking about a Mockingjay piece. Highlight some of Aspen's best moments inter-cut with scenes of rebel uprisings and war footage. Good thing is, I caught a lot of her interactions in the Capitol the first time around. Things that the rest of the cameras never saw. It'll help remind them of just the simple girl from District 12. We call that one 'Fire is catching.' And then Fulvia came up with a really brilliant idea."

My stomach was roiling around. What had Cressida managed to capture the first time that I was in the Capitol? Things that I had talked about to Cato? A discussion between Peeta and me? My stupid individual training routine? I would be curious to see what was going to be in that propo. What, exactly, it was that Cressida had managed to capture. Fulvia's mouthful-of-sour-grapes expression was startled right off her face by Cressida's mention, but she recovered.

"Well, I don't know how brilliant it is, but I was thinking we could do a series of propos called We Remember. In each one, we would feature one of the dead Tributes. Little Rue from Eleven or old Mags from Four. Aspen's friend, Peeta. The idea being that we could target each District with a very personal piece," Fulvia explained.

No one had told me about that one. I was glad that they didn't. A sound must have escaped from my throat, because Gale reached over and grabbed my hand. Hearing their names, knowing that they would have a tribute to themselves, was like a punch in the stomach. I wanted them to be remembered and loved, but it was strange to know that they were going to be used as causes for the rebellion. At least they could be of some use, even after their deaths.

Who did I even know that they could use? Glimmer? Yeah, right. She hated me. Not Marvel or Clove or Coral. They were Careers. Thresh, likely enough. Finch, too. They were my friends. People who had hated the Games and refused to play them on anyone's terms but their own. Maybe Wiress from the Quell. The Morphlings, who had risked their lives to save me and Cato. Maybe all of the Tributes who had risked their lives to save ours.

"A tribute to your Tributes, as it were," Plutarch said, interrupting my train of thought.

"That is brilliant, Fulvia. It's the perfect way to remind people why they're fighting," I said sincerely.

"I think it could work. I thought we might use Finnick to intro and narrate the spots. If there was interest in them," Fulvia said.

That was a good idea. Finnick knew most of them, anyways. "Frankly, I don't see how we could have too many We Remember propos. Can you start producing them today?" Coin asked.

"Of course," Fulvia said, obviously mollified by the response to her idea.

It was the first time that I had really felt that I might have liked Fulvia. Beforehand she had reminded me of an even worse version of Effie, whom I actually liked. Cressida had managed to smooth everything over in the creative department with her gesture. Praised Fulvia for what was, in fact, a really good idea, and cleared the way to continue her own on-air depiction of the Mockingjay. Everyone was suddenly feeling much better and no one was fighting. Of course, Haymitch would likely soon change that with me.

What was really interesting was that Plutarch seemed to have no need to share in the credit. All he wanted was for the Airtime Assault to work. I remembered that Plutarch was a Head Gamemaker, not a member of the crew. Not a piece in the Games. Just like Seneca had been. They would never take credit. Therefore, their worth was not defined by a single element, but by the overall success of the production. If we won the war, that was when Plutarch will take his bow. And expect his reward.

The president sent everyone off to get to work, so Gale and Katniss wheeled me back to the hospital. We laughed a little about the cover-up. Gale said that no one wanted to look bad by admitting they couldn't control us. Katniss said that Boggs likely didn't want to admit that Gale could break his nose. I was kinder, saying they probably didn't want to jeopardize the chance of taking us out again now that they had gotten some decent footage. They were all probably true.

After chatting with them for a little while about what had happened, I realized that it was for the best that we hadn't told anyone the truth of what had happened in Eight. It was a good choice. Coin would have realized that I was fighting for myself, for what I needed. That would have been breaching my contract with Coin. Leaving my fate - and more importantly, Cato's - to Thirteen. Gale and Katniss eventually had to go meet Beetee down in Special Weaponry, so I dozed off.

Just as I was so used to, I was back in my same hospital bed. Likely going to have a nightmare again, as I so usually did. But, to my surprise, I didn't have a nightmare. Instead I managed to sleep through at least a few hours before finally waking up again. Seneca was standing right over the bed. It looked like he had recently walked into the room. I jumped slightly and placed a hand over my chest. I was a little irritable that he didn't even both to say anything to me.

"Say something next time. You scared me," I growled.

"I'm sorry," Seneca said, placing a hand on my shoulder. "I think there's something you should see."

"Okay," I said.

"Cato's family would like to speak with you afterwards," Seneca said.

"It looked like they did earlier. Dean, Skye, and Julie are okay?" I asked.

I had seen them in the meeting, but I wasn't sure exactly how mentally fit they were from what had happened in Eight. "They're fine. A little banged up and tired, but otherwise healthy," Seneca said.

"Good. Is Haymitch angry about the headpiece?"

"Yes."

"I figured."

There was no way that I was getting out of being yelled at for that. "That was a foolish thing that you did. Taking the earpiece out. You could have been hurt. We warned you not to," Seneca said. For some reason, I actually felt a little badly for not listening to him. Maybe because I knew how much he was trying to help me. "But you did anyways. Just as you so often did. I am very glad to say that I was wrong. You were right to do what you did."

A small smile tilted up on the corners of my lips. Finally someone else was in the wrong. "Thank you, Seneca," I said slowly.

"You did wonderfully out there," Seneca said.

"I needed to see it. I needed to see just what I meant to these people."

"You mean the world to them. To all of us. As much more than the Mockingjay."

"That hospital -"

"Stop blaming yourself for it. It would have been destroyed soon enough. It was going to happen regardless. At least we made something good out of it," Seneca said truthfully.

"You're right. As you so often are. Stop being right," I snapped.

Seneca grinned softly. "I'll try my hardest."

As we strode down the hallway, I turned to look at Seneca. "Where are we going?" I asked.

"My compartment," Seneca answered nonchalantly.

"Oh?" I asked teasingly.

"Don't get excited," Seneca shot back.

His voice was so nonchalant that it almost surprised me. Actually, all of his words surprised me. My head shot towards him as the two of us hesitated in the hallway. The two of us stared at each other blankly for a moment. Seneca's face quickly turned into one of horror. It was obvious that he was terrified by what he had said to me, given our past together. Given those kisses and nights together that had always turned me into a complete blubbering mess.

The last time that Seneca and I had been in a bedroom together, things hadn't ended well. Things were different now. It wouldn't happen. Not anymore. This time I really didn't think that it was that insulting and I knew that it hadn't been meant like that. It was almost relieving. I liked hearing him tease me. It made me think that he was a real person. Plus, for whatever reason, I had gotten over what happened those nights. So I merely laughed. Seneca looked very concerned for a moment before laughing himself.

"I'm surprised that you laughed," Seneca said, once we had both calmed down.

"Something funny about it, I suppose. I've gotten over that night," I said honestly.

"I'm very glad to hear that. It's something that I'll always feel guilty about," Seneca said.

"Maybe it's good that you carry around some guilt. That you weren't able to just forget about it. Shows that you're human, you have some remorse. But I forgive you, Seneca," I said, grabbing his hand.

Seneca smiled, giving my hand a tight squeeze. "Good. I'm on your side."

"I know."

It was nice to know that someone was on my side. We walked into Seneca's compartment a moment later and the door slid closed behind me. I looked around, quickly realizing that it looked nothing like the one in the Capitol. There were no colors in here. It was all grey and white. He only seemed to have a few personal things with him. It was also slightly larger than the compartment that I was in now, but this one had no windows. It must have been reserved for higher-ups.

"It's nicer than mine," I commented.

"Is it?" Seneca asked curiously.

"Yeah."

"It's quite small."

Snorting under my breath, I shook my head and stepped into the room. "Compared to your old apartment in the Capitol? Yes. This is small. But it's larger than the one Katniss, Prim, Ms. Everdeen, and I live in," I said.

"They'd probably give you a bigger one if you asked," Seneca reasoned.

"No need. I'm in the hospital more often anyways."

Seneca smiled. "We'll have to work on that."

"Good luck." The two of us snorted at each other. "What did you want to show me?" I asked curiously.

Seneca pulled something out of his pocket that I stared at. What was that supposed to be? "This was captured on security footage from District Seven just a few hours ago," Seneca explained.

"Seven?" I asked dumbly.

"Watch."

After what had happened in District 8, I wasn't so sure that I wanted to see what had happened in District 7. I didn't want to see more death. Seneca pushed me towards the television as I stepped back and perched myself on the edge of Seneca's bed to watch what had happened. It had been... maybe half a day since they put out the footage that Messalla had done. It had been about two days since the first one was released. What could have happened in such a short span of time?

The screen popped up and I raised a brow. I had only seen District 7 once before. This clearly wasn't anywhere near the Town Square that I had seen during the Victory Tour. There was a group of almost fifty lumberjacks heading out towards the forest with axes slung over their shoulders. I assumed that they were heading to cut down the trees. They were being escorted by at least twenty Peacekeepers, and the logs of wood on their sides were being defended by even more, armed, Peacekeepers.

Things were really that bad that they needed all of those Peacekeepers just for some simple lumberjacks. They were all being kept apart from each other, likely to ensure that no one was speaking to each other. All of the Peacekeepers - who were following the lumberjacks - had their guns pointed to the people's backs. How could they have possibly fought back against them? They were outnumbered and literally outgunned. As I looked over at Seneca, he motioned for me to look back at the screen.

"By order of President Snow daily production quotas have been increased. All work shifts will be extended by an extra two hours. Failure to meet these quotas will not be tolerated," a voice on a speaker called out.

The screen went dark for just a moment and I raised a brow. What was that supposed to have shown me? That things were bad in the other Districts? I knew that. But the screen lit up again and I nodded. The men and women were now walking through the woods, the Peacekeepers still following closely behind them. I still didn't understand why Seneca wanted me to see this, but I decided to humor him and keep watching quietly.

"By order of President Snow daily production quotas have been increased," the voice repeated.

They were walking in silence for a few moments as my hands wrung together. I was getting nervous now. Something was going to happen. I knew it. That was when it happened. I saw a dark-skinned man glance up slightly, his eyes locking on something in the distance. I moved in closer to the screen to see what it was. A Mockingjay... My Mockingjay was carved into a tree that they were all walking past. Who the hell had managed to put that there? I guessed that wasn't too important.

Suddenly that same man let out the three-note whistle that Rue had taught me in the arena. I didn't get a chance to be slightly hurt by the sound of it. Without warning the lumberjacks started sprinting forward, screaming at the tops of their lungs. I gasped softly, placing a hand over my mouth. The Peacekeepers stopped walking, getting down into shooting positions, firing round after round. I cringed as I watched men and women collapse to the ground, most of them dead.

But most of them managed to get away. I couldn't understand what they were doing at first, but then I saw it. They were scaling the trees just the way that I had done. As the surviving lumberjacks made their way into the trees, the Peacekeepers stopped below them, firing upwards. A few more fell before they vanished and the Peacekeepers stopped firing, watching the trees closely. There were still some firing in the distance, but it was otherwise eerily silent.

Then it came. A voice from far off. "If we burn, you burn with us!"

It was a lumberjack hiding up in the trees. Repeating the same words that I had said in the propo. I had actually managed to convince them to fight back. Right as he finished shouting, a number of mines exploded. I jumped slightly, startled by what had happened, as the lumberjacks started to cheer. They were all smiling and laughing, giving each other thumbs up. There wasn't a single Peacekeeper left alive after the mines had all exploded. It was a small victory, but one nonetheless.

The screen went silent after a few seconds of the lumberjacks cheering. As Seneca turned the television off, I leaned down onto my hands and knees. That had really happened. They were really fighting back like that. I was astounded. They had actually managed to win a small fight. I stayed silent for a long time after watching the video, trying to make sense of everything that had happened. A lot of people had died for that one small victory. To take out the hoard of Peacekeepers.

But they thought that it was worth it. And maybe it was. Maybe there was a chance that it had all been worth it. Because at least now they were all able to fight freely. They didn't have nearly the number of Peacekeepers in the area anymore. They could kill the rest of them. For the first time I really realized that this whole war wasn't just for me. It was for all of us. Those four million people who had been beaten down for the past seventy-five years and long before that.

Even though I had just seen it, I still couldn't believe that my words had really managed to force people to do something. At least, I had inspired them to do something. People who were repeating my words to the people that they were fighting against. I almost asked Seneca to play it again, I was so surprised at the turn of events in District 7. It was fascinating to see how hard they were fighting for me and what they believed in. I was almost pleased. Maybe not pleased... impressed.

Their deaths would likely still haunt me - as they always did - but I found myself nodding along, impressed by their actions. They had been far braver than I could have ever credited them with. I knew that fighting back would mean their deaths. We wouldn't ever have a win without suffering some losses. But they didn't care. They were determined to make things better. Just like I was. As I continued nodding at the screen, I found myself almost smiling.

"They're fighting back even harder now," I commented.

"Because of you. Coin thought that it would be pointless to show you this footage. But I knew that you needed to see it. You need to see just what you do for the people," Seneca said, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"Thank you. You're right. I needed to see this," I said, looking at him. "These people really do have faith in me. Even better, they have faith in each other."

"All because of you. They're finally able to stand up for themselves."

"Are those all of the Peacekeepers in Seven?"

"No. But that was a good number of them. They can fight back against the rest."

It was just what I had been thinking. "This is happening all over Panem?" I asked.

Seneca nodded, making me feel a slight jolt of excitement. "It is. Some are smaller victories, we're still suffering some losses, but we're moving forward. We will continue to move forward. Even in our smallest actions," Seneca said.

It made an old comment come to mind. "Those loyal to you will always be loyal. Even in their smallest actions."

Seneca raised a brow. "Who said that?"

"Cinna."

"He was right."

"He was. I really appreciate you showing me that. I think I needed to see it."

"That's why I showed you."

The two of us sat in silence for a while. I was fiddling at the laces on my boots. "Will you get in trouble for showing me?" I asked.

Seneca shrugged, like he could care less. Maybe he couldn't. "Maybe a little talking-to. But after Snow confronting me as many times as he did during your Games, I find myself a little less susceptible to threats," Seneca explained.

How many times had Seneca gotten a talking-to during my Games? "That's a fair point," I muttered.

"The Hadley's would still like to speak with you," Seneca said.

"I know. I'm trying to put it off."

Seneca grinned. "Why is that?"

"Because they're going to ask me how I am, just like everyone else has been doing. I know that it's the right thing to do, telling them the truth about what happened..." I said, realizing that they didn't know exactly what had happened in Eight, unless the others had told them. "I guess I just don't want even more people concerned about me."

"They care."

"They're some of the few."

"We all care about you, Aspen," Seneca said, placing a hand on my knee.

"Thank you," I said, forcing a smile on my lips. "I should go and speak to them, shouldn't I?"

Seneca nodded, giving me a hand back to my feet. I was still slightly dizzy. "You should. They want to see you. But you can stay for a while if you would like," Seneca offered.

"If I stay, I'll start snooping through your things," I said truthfully.

"You're more than welcome. I didn't get a chance to bring many of my things with me."

"They've probably destroyed most of your things by now," I said, realizing too late that it was probably rude.

"Yes, they probably have," Seneca sighed.

"Does that bother you?" I asked.

Seneca was silent for a moment before shaking his head. "Not particularly. There aren't many things that I have that mean much to me," he finally admitted.

"So what means something to you?" I asked curiously.

"This does," Seneca said, motioning between the two of us.

The two of us smiled at each other for a moment. "I should go. See the Hadley's."

"Enjoy."

We exchanged a quick hug as I turned towards the door. "Are the Hadley's in their compartment?"

"I believe so."

"I guess I've stalled on talking to them long enough. I'll talk to you soon."

"Have a good night," Seneca called.

"You too!" I called back.

As I walked out the door, I listened to it hiss shut behind me. Odd, the way that things had changed. Not long ago, I had shot out of Seneca's room in tears. Now I was leaving it as a friend. I walked out of the hallway and back down the one where I used to live. My steps were slightly staggered, but I managed to get to the Hadley's compartment relatively unscathed. I walked up to the door, watched it open, and stepped inside to find the entire family sitting around and chatting.

"Hi," I greeted.

"Aspen, dear. Come in," Alana said brightly.

She darted over to me and gave me a small hug. "Thanks," I said, pulling away from her slightly. I turned towards Skye and smiled. The cuts were much smaller. "Your face is looking better, Skye."

"Just a few cuts and scrapes. Nothing that I can't handle," Skye said carelessly.

"What about your foot, Julie?" I asked.

Julie shrugged her shoulders. She was perched up on one of the beds and had her foot in a kind of cast. "I might be laid up on the next outing, but it'll be back to normal soon. The doctors were telling us that it isn't that big of a deal. A broken toe. I might ignore them and go out anyways," Julie said, making me smile.

"You most certainly will not," Alana said sharply.

It was clear enough that Alana was like a mother to all of us. Julie flushed slightly and muttered, "Sorry."

Deciding that I should step forward and save the argument, I moved into the center of the room. "Don't worry, Julie. I'm sure by the time that they're ready to let me out on the next mission, your foot will be healed," I said hopefully.

"They're going to start being very careful about where they send you. District Eight was dangerous enough," Dean said.

He was right about that. It had been dangerous out there. "Did anyone tell you that we were headed there?" I asked carefully, knowing that Alana wouldn't be happy if they hadn't.

"No," Alana said sharply.

"They told us after you were gone," Damien said.

It was like what I imagined apologizing to my birth mother and father would have been like. "I'm sorry. We should have said something," I said awkwardly.

Dean stepped in, knowing how uncomfortable I was. "It wasn't supposed to be an active situation. We were just supposed to be taking Aspen in to do some propos. But the Capitol launched a surprise attack," Dean said.

That was when I spotted how disheveled Alana looked. She moved forward, placing a hand on Dean's shoulder. "Please, Dean, I've... I've already lost two children. I'd like to not lose another. Any one of the four of you. I know that it wasn't supposed to be active. But... next time... just think a little bit," Alana said, her voice weaker than normal.

Guilt. A horrible guilt wracked through me. She made a good point. "We will, Alana. We're sorry," I said sincerely.

"It's okay. Just say something next time," Alana whispered.

Each one of us nodded. There was no way that we wouldn't tell them next time. It wasn't fair for me to have left. Not without telling Prim or Ms. Everdeen. Not the Hadley's either. As I turned around the room, I noticed that Carrie had some tears in her eyes. She must not have gotten a goodbye from Dean either. I suddenly felt extremely guilty. We should have all said something to the people that we loved. It was a mistake on all of our parts.

"We won't do it again. Sorry, Mom. Everyone," Dean promised.

"We're just glad that you were all okay. It got dangerous out there," Carrie muttered, her voice cracking.

But they also needed to hear the truth of what was out there. "It's dangerous everywhere, I'm afraid. No matter where we go out, we'll be facing something. I know that I shouldn't say that, but it's the truth. Maybe things will be different one day. Not today," I said, hoping that I wasn't making things worse.

"You're right. Things won't change until this war is over. That could be a while," Damien agreed.

"Yes," I whispered.

"How are you doing, Aspen?" Alana asked.

"I'm alive. I'll live," I answered.

The room was tensely silent for a moment. "You did wonderfully in that propo that they shot," Carrie finally said.

"I suppose. I just... I just said what came to mind," I said dumbly.

In all honesty, I was shocked that it had come to mind. "Haymitch is wrong for telling you that you're not a good public speaker," Carrie said.

Waving her off, I shook my head. "No, he's right," I said, hating to admit that Haymitch was right about anything. "Just look at what it takes to bring out a genuine performance from me."

"It's a start," Alana said.

"You were great out there. Those hoverplanes that you brought down... That was incredible," Julie said.

"I should have taken them all down. We should have taken them all down," I said bitterly.

If they had all come down, maybe there was a chance that the hospital would still be there. "We tried. We were close. There's nothing wrong with what happened out there. Nothing that was your fault, anyways. It was all planned out by the Capitol. We couldn't have changed anything. You couldn't have," Skye said.

"Doesn't change the fact that I'll always feel guilty for it," I mumbled.

"We're sorry, Aspen. We genuinely are," Alana said, moving forward and grabbing my arm.

The entire family smiled at me. Except Julie, who was still grimacing because of her foot. "Cato will be proud when he sees what you did out there," Damien said.

That was what kept me going. "I think you're right," I said honestly.

"We'll get to hear that he thinks about all of this soon enough," Alana said brightly.

"Soon," I promised, grabbing her hand. "As soon as we possibly can."

"Good. We miss him," Aidan said sadly.

Of course Aidan would be upset. Cato was his big brother and his best friend. "I know. I miss him too. I promise that we're going to let you all know before we leave next time," I said determinedly.

"We appreciate that," Alana said sweetly.

We all smiled at each other as I let out a deep breath. My head was starting to spin again and my legs were growing weak again. "As much as I would love to stay and chat for a little while, I'm really tired. Concussion is still getting to me. I think I'm going to go back and get some rest at the hospital," I said.

"Enjoy your nap. Get some rest," Alana said.

"It was a long trip. You earned it," Dean said.

"Thank you. I'll see you all soon."

"Goodnight," Damien called.

Before I could leave, Alana stepped forward. "All four of you - warn us next time that you're planning on leaving for a mission. No matter what the mission is supposed to be," she warned.

"Of course," I said.

"We will," Dean promised.

"Yes, Alana," Skye said guiltily.

"Sorry," Julie muttered.

"See you all tomorrow," I called.

Everyone smiled and gave me hugs as I turned to leave. I definitely had to get out of here before my legs collapsed and I hit the ground. I wished that I had the wheelchair back for now. But it was in the hospital, the place that I wasn't allowed to leave quite yet, which was very unfortunate. I almost missed living in the compartment. There were too many horrible memories of myself in this place. And I missed being around Katniss and Prim all the time. But the moment my head hit the pillow, I was out like a light.

It seemed like I had only shut my eyes for a few minutes, but when I opened them, I flinched at the sight of Haymitch sitting in a chair a couple of feet from my bed. Waiting. He didn't look bothered, simply bored. Of course he was here. I thought about opening my mouth to scream. But he wasn't going to hurt me. He must have been here for a while. Possibly for several hours if the clock was right. I was still thinking about hollering for a witness, but I was going to have to face him sooner or later.

The two of us stared at each other for a few moments. Neither one of us knew how to start the conversation. Actually, Haymitch probably knew what to say, so I was just waiting for him to start the argument. Haymitch finally leaned forward and dangled something on a thin white wire in front of my nose. For a moment I thought that he was going to whack me with it. It was hard to focus on, but I was pretty sure what it was. He dropped it to the sheets.

"Damn. I almost thought this was a nightmare," I groaned.

"Oh, it is, sweetheart," Haymitch warned. "That is your earpiece. I will give you exactly one more chance to wear it. If you remove it from your ear again, I'll have you fitted with this."

It wasn't just a threat. I was no fool. I knew that Haymitch would go through with whatever threat he wanted to deliver to me. It made my stomach churn nervously. Whatever it was that he was going to show me, it wasn't something that I would want. I was able to figure that out easily. Haymitch held up some sort of metal headgear that I instantly named the head shackle. It looked like some sort of Capitol torture device, an image I quickly started to beat back as Cato came into my imagination.

"It's an alternative audio unit that locks around your skull and under your chin until it's opened with a key. And I'll have the only key. If for some reason you're clever enough to disable it," Haymitch dumped the head shackle on the bed and whipped out a tiny silver chip, "I'll authorize them to surgically implant this transmitter into your ear so that I may speak to you twenty-four hours a day."

Haymitch in my head full-time. Horrifying. Definitely not something that I could deal with. "I'll keep the earpiece in," I muttered.

"Excuse me?" Haymitch asked.

"I'll keep the earpiece in!" I yelled, loudly enough to wake up half the hospital.

"You sure? Because I'm equally happy with any of the three options," Haymitch said.

"I'm sure," I said.

The thought of having to listen to Haymitch all the time gave me a horrible feeling in my gut. He was a pain in my ass. The last thing that I wanted was for him to be able to wake me up at three in the morning with some complaint about me. I scrunched up the earpiece wire protectively in my fist and flung the head shackle back in Haymitch's face with my free hand, but he caught it easily. Probably was expecting me to throw it. He was good with expecting my movements, just like that day on the hovercraft.

"Anything else?" I finally asked.

Haymitch rose to his feet to leave. "While I was waiting... I ate your lunch."

My eyes took in the empty stew bowl and tray on my bed table. "I'm going to report you," I mumbled into my pillow.

"You do that, sweetheart."

Haymitch went out, safe in the knowledge that I wasn't the reporting kind. I honestly didn't really care that he ate my dinner. I wasn't hungry and I really didn't like the food that they served in Thirteen anyways. Plus I was still thinking about what had happened in Seven. Those thoughts and images constantly running through my mind was enough to make me sick and not at all hungry. I would just eat later and be miserable right now. At least, miserable for a long time.

Laying on my stomach, I tried to force myself to close my eyes. I really wanted to go back to sleep, but I was restless. Images from yesterday - or was it the day before? - began to flood into the present. The bombing, the fiery plane crashes, the faces of the wounded who no longer existed. I imagined death from all sides. I was also seeing everything that had happened in Seven. Those people who had been shot dead. The bombs that had destroyed the squadron of Peacekeepers.

That was when my nightmare delved back into what had happened in Eight. The last moment before seeing a shell hit the ground, feeling the wing blown from my plane and the dizzying nosedive into oblivion, the warehouse roof fell down towards me while I was pinned helplessly to my cot. They were all things that I saw, in person or on the tape. Things I caused with a pull of my bowstring. Things I would never be able to erase from my memory.

It was only about an hour that I attempted to sleep. There was no way that I could sleep right now. No way that I would be able to sleep for a long time. Not with all of the thoughts in my mind. So I sat up and reached down my shirt. I pulled out the chain that was hanging there and started twirling Cato's wedding ring around my fingers. I tried to almost always have something of his on me. It made me feel like he was still here with me. Not hundreds of miles away.

As I tried to fit it on my thumb - the only finger it fit on - Gale walked into the room. I tucked the ring back into my jumpsuit. "Hey," I said, smiling at him.

"Hey. I got good news," Gale said happily.

"What?" I asked.

"Coin agreed to let us hunt above ground," Gale said.

Weren't we already allowed to hunt above ground? That was when the answer dawned on me. "Today?" I asked.

"Today," Gale confirmed.

A small smile broke across my face. "Is Katniss coming?" I asked.

"She's still a little sore from the trip to Eight," Gale said.

"She's okay?"

"She's fine. Been sleeping a lot. I think she got a little bit of a concussion from one of the blasts."

"I know how she feels."

Gale smiled softly. "Ready to go?" Gale asked.

"Let's do it," I confirmed.

In the back of my mind, I knew that it was the wrong thing to do. My head was still spinning slightly from the concussion. But I wanted to get out of Thirteen for a while. So the two of us headed out towards the fence that would lead us into the woods. We stopped long enough to get the trackers fitted onto our ankles and have them warn us to be careful with me - considering that I now had two back-to-back concussions to deal with.

Once we had everything together, we left to get our bows and arrows. Once the two of us had grabbed our weapons, we headed back towards the security fence. Together the two of us made our way out into the woods. We were moving slightly slower than usual, as I figured that Gale wanted to keep me safe from an accident. I did find myself at peace with the way that we didn't actually speak. We just hunted together. Just like the old days.

It was easily the most effective hunting trip that we had had since I had gone into the first Games. Before that, we had been unstoppable. After that, there had been a number of issues. Right now, things were almost back to normal. It did help that the animals were easy to bring down, as they weren't at all suspicious. Gale was working easily with me, not saying a word about the odd relationship that we had found ourselves in lately. It was nice. Normal.

After a while, Gale and I found ourselves playing an old game that we used to play all the time. Trying to beat each other out for the most catches. My first arrow was blind and I was surprised when a squirrel fell directly in front of me. I had only gotten the foot, which wasn't a kill shot, but I'd still hit it. I bent down and slit the throat. Standing back up, I tossed it in the game bag and turned to Gale with a sly grin. It was a lucky shot, but I still made it, and I had made sure not to let the surprise show on my face.

Afterwards Gale had gotten a rabbit. After that had been a few more squirrels, Gale had gotten one and I'd gotten two. Then there had been two quails, Gale had gotten both. Another squirrel had gone to me after that, and we'd been tied again. We had then decided to turn back, making a wide arc to clear a new section of the woods. On the way back I had immediately caught two squirrels, and then Gale had caught another two. We were now starting to head to the river with a tie on our hands.

Moving back and forth, the two of us searched and searched for another animal. That was when I spotted it. There was a deer not far away. As much as I wanted to rush for it, I didn't want to startle the deer. So I hesitated and nodded to Gale. We could share this shot. Gale pulled apart the bushes so that I could kneel down on a knee and raise my bow. I had an arrow aimed straight at its head when the deer looked at us. It didn't even move. It didn't sense the obvious danger that it was in.

"It's not even afraid of us," I said, a little bothered.

"It's cause they've never been hunted before. It's almost not fair," Gale said.

Lowering the bow, I decided not to shoot the deer. I didn't really want to have to carry the deer back anyways. Gale and I headed out to the river to sunbathe, just as we had the other day. We were still sitting in silence. It was the way that we had always been. There were a number of things that we needed to say, but nothing that he wanted to. So we perched ourselves on the rocks and I leaned my head against Gale's shoulder. A long time passed that we sat in silence before Gale's communicuff started to ring.

I sat up and watched as Gale read the message. "They want us back," Gale said.

"For?" I asked.

"Not sure," Gale said.

There was something about the moment that didn't sit quite right with me. They had just spoken to us not that long ago. What could they have possibly wanted right now? I guessed that we would find out later. So Gale and I headed back to Thirteen. I was getting a little lightheaded anyways. Gale had his game bag and I had mine. I felt a little more unnerved than normal. I never had liked being brought anywhere in Thirteen. I always felt like they were ready to execute me over the smallest things.

Eventually we made our way back into District 13. They removed the trackers from our ankles and the two of us headed towards the kitchen. We had to drop off our bows and arrows and the game bags before heading to wherever it was that they wanted us. We walked into the elevator together and stood back against the metal walls.

"They asked us to head for Command," Gale said.

"Alright. I gotta drop these off, then my jacket," I said, motioning to my father's hunting jacket.

"Okay," Gale said.

The two of us walked through the kitchen and into the cooking section. The two of us tossed our catches at Greasy Sae and stopped to talk to her for a few minutes. Once we were done, we headed back to my compartment to return my jacket. I didn't want to destroy it. I also wanted to take as much time as possible to make sure that I had some time to calm down before heading off to Command, where they likely wanted to talk more about what had happened in Eight.

To my surprised, when we walked into my compartment, someone was already there. But it wasn't Katniss, Prim, or Ms. Everdeen. Instead it was Finnick. Considering that it was dinnertime, it seemed that Finnick had brought his tray to my bed so that we could watch the newest propo together on television. He was assigned a quarters on my old floor, but he had so many mental relapses, he still basically lived in the hospital. Of course, it seemed that way for me too sometimes.

The rebels aired the 'Because you know who they are and what they do' propo that Messalla edited. The footage was intercut with short studio clips of Gale, Katniss, Boggs, and Cressida describing the incident. It was hard to watch my reception in the hospital in Eight since I knew what was coming. When the bombs rained down on the roof, I buried my face in my pillow and Gale's shoulder, looking up again at a brief clip of me at the end, after all the victims were dead.

At least Finnick didn't applaud or act all happy when it was done. He just said, "People should know that happened. And now they do."

"Let's turn it off, Finnick, before they run it again," I urged him. But as Finnick's hand moved toward the remote control, I cried, "Wait!"

It was the moment that I saw it. The picture of the Capitol seal. I had to know... It might have been... The Capitol was introducing a special segment and something about it looked familiar. I knew exactly what this was going to be. The moment of silence was far too long. But, yes, it was Caesar Flickerman. And I could guess who his guest was going to be. As the screen faded in and I saw Caesar, I realized that he was in a floral suit this time, looking even more somber than he had been in his first interview with Cato.

"She was arguably our favorite Tribute. And I think that's what we all find most astonishing, is that this girl was adored in the Capitol. And I think for you, Cato, it must be particularly painful," Caesar prompted.

The camera wasn't facing Cato. It was still on Caesar. I was so desperate to see him. So desperate to know what was happening to him while I couldn't see him. Not in person, at least. Finally the camera moved to the other side of the table to show Cato. Or, actually, it was showing his legs. He was clearly wearing a black suit, different from the white one that he had been in the first interview. As it trailed up his body, I saw that he was holding a white rose in his hand. It sent a chill up my spine.

"I wish I could give this rose to you, Aspen," Cato muttered.

That was when the camera finally went up to his face. Cato's physical transformation shocked me. My hand slapped itself over my mouth. Finnick and Gale's heads shot to me. The healthy, clear-eyed boy I saw a few days ago had lost at least fifteen pounds and developed a nervous tremor in his hands. They still had him groomed. But underneath the paint that couldn't cover the bags under his eyes, and the fine clothes that couldn't conceal the pain he felt when he moves, was a person badly damaged.

No... No... That couldn't be Cato. They were doing something to him. It had to be something done by the Capitol computers to make me think that they were hurting him. He just - He didn't even look like himself. His hands were twitching against the chair. His leg was bouncing. His face looked slightly bruised, definitely discolored, like he hadn't slept in a long time. His eyes didn't even look like his. They were twitching slightly as he stared down at the ground.

My mind reeled, trying to make sense of it. I just saw him! Four - no, five - I thought it was five days ago. How had he deteriorated so rapidly? What could they possibly have done to him in such a short time? Then it hit me. I replayed in my mind as much as I could of his first interview with Caesar, searching for anything that would place it in time. There was nothing. They could have taped that interview a day or two after I blew up the arena, then done whatever they wanted to do to him ever since.

"Oh, Cato..." I whispered.

Neither Gale nor Finnick reached out to touch me. I didn't want them to. My hand went up to the screen but dropped before I could touch it. How could I have been so stupid to think that they actually hadn't hurt him? They were likely torturing him in the worst possible way. He looked like he didn't even know his own name. His words didn't have the same spark and life that they normally did. No anger, no sorrow, no nothing. Just a... blankness that didn't match with him.

"He's changed so much already. What are they doing to him?" I asked desperately.

"A sweet gesture for a girl who has inspired such violence. You must love her very much to be able to forgive her," Caesar said.

"He's shaking," I sobbed.

What had they done to him? What the hell were they doing to my husband? "I don't think that I could. Unless, of course, Cato, you think that perhaps she's being forced into saying things that she doesn't even understand," Caesar said.

Cato finally looked up. "Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly what I think," Cato said, sounding careless.

"Even his voice is different," I said, unable to hear any emotion in his voice.

"They're using her, obviously. I think they're using her to whip up the rebels. I doubt she even knows what's happening and what's really at stake," Cato continued.

"Now, Cato, I doubt that the rebels will ever let her see this. But if they do, what would you say to her? To Aspen Antaeus, the once sweet Aspen Antaeus. What would you say?" Caesar asked.

"I would... I would tell her to think for herself," Cato said.

"Yes," Caesar prompted

There was a brief silence on Cato's part. Cato looked into the camera before turning away and then looking back at the camera. It felt like he was looking right at me. It felt like he was speaking directly to me. My heart skipped a beat. We had to get him back. I needed him back here. He was going to die there. He already looked terrible. Without missing a beat, a tear slipped out of Cato's eyes. My hands were shaking against my knees.

"Don't be a fool, Aspen. Think for yourself. They've turned you into a weapon that could be instrumental in the destruction of humanity. I know you never wanted the rebellion. The things that you did in the Games were never intended to start all of this. The rebels have made you into something that you're not, something that could destroy all of us. So if you have any power or any say in what they do or how they use you; please, please, urge them to stop this war before it's too late, and ask yourself, can you trust the people you're working with? Do you know what they really want? And if you don't... find out," Cato said.

A tear slipped out of Cato's eyes as I wiped away the corner of my own. "We need to respond," Gale said, barely acknowledging what we had just seen.

"Thank you, Cato Hadley, for these revelations about the real Mockingjay," Caesar said.

Black screen. Seal of Panem. Show over. I turned back to Gale with tightened jaws. In the meantime, Finnick pressed the button on the remote that killed the power. In a minute, people would be here to do damage control on Cato's condition and the words that came out of his mouth. I would need to repudiate them. But the truth was, I didn't trust the rebels or Plutarch or Coin. I wasn't confident that they told me the truth. I wouldn't be able to conceal this. Footsteps were approaching.

Finnick gripped me hard by the arms. "We didn't see it."

"What?" I asked.

"We didn't see Cato. Only the propo on Eight. Then we turned the set off because the images upset you. Got it?" Finnick asked. I nodded. "Finish your dinner."

But something that Gale had said was still bothering me. "But did you see what he looks like?" I asked Gale, turning to him.

"I saw a coward," Gale said.

"You don't have any idea what he's going through," I snapped.

"I don't care!" Gale shouted. "I would never say what he just said. Not if they tortured me, not with a gun to my head."

Finnick was watching us closely. "You've never been in the Capitol before, Gale. You have no idea if he even has any choice in the words that he's saying. I know just how terrible these people are. He - He's..." I trailed off, unable to say exactly what was happening to him.

"A coward," Gale finished.

As per usual, it was one step forward and two steps back with us. We could only get along so well for a while before something happened - normally with Cato - that made me angry. So I reached out and slapped Gale before I could think better of it. I had never hit him before. Not really. I could see the hesitance in Gale's face when he finally managed to look back at me. Finnick was in a slightly defensive position for what might happen. But I knew that Gale wouldn't hit me back.

For a moment I thought about apologizing to him. But something much different came out. "That is the same Cato that defended you after the whipping post. That's the same Cato that asked you to take care of me after he was gone. He's always defended you, despite everything that's happened," I snarled.

"No, it's not. Now he's only defending himself," Gale said. We stared at each other before Gale's phone rang. "Coin's called a meeting, we need to respond."

Gale turned away and started to walk off. "When did 'we' become you and Coin?" I asked, disgusted by the thought.

Gale turned back to me with a slight snarl on his mouth. "Everyone has a choice. How can he sit there in the Capitol and defend the people who destroyed his wife's home, tore apart his, and murdered part of his family?" Gale asked.

That was when it dawned on me. What was going to have to happen once Beetee got through the Capitol's airwaves. "He doesn't know. How could he? Nobody's seen what the Capitol did to Twelve. He doesn't know about the martial law in Two. He doesn't know about Leah. I have to show them," I said determinedly.

The footsteps were growing louder. "Quiet. Now. We can all talk about this later. Don't mention Cato," Finnick warned.

Gale and I stared at each other for a moment. Neither one of us would mention the slap again. Gale clearly felt guilty about what he said. Like everything else, we would brush this off. I pulled myself together enough so that when Plutarch and Fulvia entered, I had a mouthful of bread and cabbage. Finnick was talking about how well Gale came across on camera. We congratulated them on the propo. Made it clear it was so powerful, we tuned out right afterward. They looked relieved. They believed us.

No one mentioned Cato.

Chapter 10: Chapter Ten

For a long time I merely wallowed in my own misery from what I had just seen. My hands were constantly shaking as I tried to blink back the images of Cato. Slowly getting worse and worse, looking like he was starving and slowly dying there. I had never been quite so disturbed by the sight of him. Not even back in the days that he was a ruthless Career. The broken and emotionless man that I saw in the Capitol propo was something completely different.

Nothing made me angrier than what I could imagine that the Capitol was doing to him. I couldn't even imagine what they were doing to him. Likely something cruel that would horrify me. It just made me realize that my nightmares were right. They really were treating him terribly. Much worse than I had thought. And the knowledge that they really were doing that to him was giving me even worse nightmares than before. The thought of everything that they were doing to him...

All I had been able to think about lately was Cato. I just needed to know what the hell they had been doing to him while he had been in the Capitol. How badly were they hurting him? How often was it happening? Likely it was terrible and happening often, much to my horror. It must have been a nightmare for him back there. Worse than anything that I had been having happen to me. Back in the Capitol and here in Thirteen. It made me feel a little guilty for complaining as much as I did.

It didn't help that I did feel a little guilty about what had just happened between Gale and me. That damned slap. I knew that I shouldn't have hit him. It was the first time that I ever had. But he had just been making me so angry and I refused to apologize for what I had done. Gale had completely deserved it. He had it coming. It was one of the last times that the two of us had interacted lately. Finnick didn't say anything about it either, so I just automatically assumed that he also felt like Gale deserved it.

Honestly I knew that the two of us should have been trying to make up, but I just couldn't. I was still so furious with what he had said to me and I was still heartbroken over what I knew was happening to Cato. So when I went to sleep, it was almost impossible to really find it. I finally stopped trying to sleep after my first few attempts were consistently interrupted by unspeakable nightmares. After that, I just laid still and did my perfected fake breathing whenever someone checked on me.

The constant trying to get me to sleep was driving me insane. It was one of the only things that they ever tried to get me to really do. Not even speak to other people or get up and move around. It was always sleep. If I didn't sleep, they just gave me pills or shots. Just like that night on the Tribute train on the Victory Tour. But those things just have me nightmares, so I usually just tried to pretend like I was asleep. My waking nightmares were bad enough.

When the morning finally dawned - after another night of restless sleep - I was almost immediately released from the hospital and instructed to take it easy. It suited me just fine. I didn't really want to have to do anything anyways. Cressida quickly brought me with her and asked me to record a few lines for a new Mockingjay propo. It was nothing that difficult. Without something to motivate me, though, I sounded just as stiff as I had the first time around.

As much as they loved what had happened after the hospital in Eight, I didn't care to repeat it anytime soon. So I tried to put as much life into my conversation as I could. But it didn't help much. Just enough to get them to leave me alone and keep me from doing anything more. At lunch, I kept waiting for people to bring up Cato's appearance with Caesar's interview, but no one ever did. No one even looked at me. Someone must have seen it besides Finnick, Gale, and me.

There was a chance that I knew exactly who else had seen it. One eye towards Seneca and I realized that he knew too. The two of us exchanged a brief nod and I knew that it meant a chat later. But I had training from the moment that we were free from lunch. Another day, it seemed. Or, at least, later in the day. Unfortunately Gale and Katniss were scheduled to work with Beetee on weapons or something, which meant no speaking to either one of them, so I got permission to take Finnick to the woods.

It was one of the first few times that I had seen him out of bed since everything had happened. I was glad to see that he was at least able to stand and walk around; albeit woozily. It was also the first chance that I had gotten to speak with someone other than Katniss, Gale, and Dean out in the woods. The moment that I figured out what I wanted to say to him, I knew that it would be worth it to get out here with him. I knew that he would tell me. Finnick had almost always been honest with me. Almost.

The two of us went out with our weapons and headed as far out from District 13 as we could. The last thing that I wanted right now was for anyone to hear what I wanted to say. If I even knew what I wanted to say. Either way, the two of us grabbed our weapons - a bow and set of arrows for me and a trident for Finnick - and walked out. We were a few miles away when I took Finnick down a new route. Clearly untouched by humans, as there were no disturbed branches or dirt piles.

There was a chance that we would start being watched a little more closely now. They would want to know if I actually had seen the footage and that meant watching me like a hawk. Just like they had done when I first got to District 13. Watching to see if I would do something stupid. Take my own life or try and escape and get back to the Capitol. That was probably what I was most likely to do. Go and get him back by myself. Ensure that no one else got hurt in the process.

Together Finnick and I wandered around aimlessly for a while and then ditched our communicators under a bush. It took a little while to get them off but we finally managed and then headed off. They would still be able to hear us. I had noticed on my second hunting trip that there was a microphone on them. I couldn't have them hearing what we were going to talk about. They couldn't know that I had seen Cato's propo. When we were a safe distance away, we finally sat and discussed Cato's broadcast.

"I haven't heard one word about it. No one's told you anything?" Finnick asked.

I shook my head. "No."

They weren't going to say anything to me with the knowledge that I might go after him. It wasn't even a might. It was a definite. I was going to go and hunt them down until I knew for a fact that he was dead. Right now I knew that he was still alive. He was still alive and they were slowly killing him. Everyone knew - with the likely exception of Cato's family - and no one was saying anything to me. Not even Katniss or Gale - both of whom I was positive knew. Especially since Gale was there.

Finnick paused for a moment before he asked, "Not even Gale?"

If only he had gone with Katniss the other day. If only he hadn't been there when the broadcast had aired. That had been where the entire day had gone to shit. Maybe if he hadn't been there, Gale wouldn't have seen the broadcast at all. That would have made things a lot easier. Unfortunately that wasn't the truth. Gale knew exactly what was happening. He knew that Cato was still alive and he knew that he was still my priority. I was sure that it would only be a matter of time before he told me as much.

"Not after yesterday. He hasn't said anything more about it," I finally said.

"Maybe he's trying to find a time to tell you privately."

"Maybe," I said.

Another few beats of silence passed as I twiddled my thumbs around the tip of my arrow. "No one else has said anything?" Finnick asked.

Earlier it looked like Seneca had wanted to say something. As usual, he would be the one to tell me something that he wasn't supposed to. "They haven't really gotten the chance. I don't think that anyone wants to be the one to bring it up. I've seen Katniss and Seneca giving me looks. They probably know. As for Cato's family..." I trailed off, unsure of where they stood.

"I very highly doubt that they've let Cato's family see it," Finnick said. I nodded blankly. I knew that they hadn't seen it. "They know what will start happening with Cato's family if they see what's become of their son."

"They should see it. They deserve to know," I mumbled.

If I hadn't seen it, would anyone even have blinked an eye at Cato's current state? "Of course. But they won't tell them. They don't want anyone encouraging a rescue prematurely," Finnick said.

"It wouldn't be prematurely," I growled.

There had never been a premature moment for rescue. From the moment that he had been taken, it had been too late. "Not for you, but for them," Finnick said. The two of us sat in silence for a long while before Finnick spoke again. "It's interesting that you've finally found yourself on speaking terms - good terms even - with Seneca Crane."

His words were drawn out and held a knowing tone. I knew that he was referring to our many conversations where I had expressed my once-fear of Seneca. "I know. Guess I just found a reason to trust him," I said awkwardly.

Finnick nodded blankly. For a moment I thought that he was going to tell me what a fool I was being, trying to be friends with Seneca. The truth was that Finnick had told me two very different things at two very different times. Both that Seneca was a good man and that he wasn't. No matter what, I honestly believed that he was a good man, now at least. I genuinely believed that he was one of the few people here that was as determined as I was to get Cato back.

"I'm glad," Finnick said, almost surprising me. "He's a good man. He just needed to get out of the Capitol."

"Yeah, I know," I muttered.

Another brief silence passed. "He cares very deeply for you," Finnick finally said.

Something struck me as strange about the way that he said it. "What's that supposed to mean?" I asked curiously, turning to Finnick.

His face was unreadable. "Nothing. It just means that he cares for your well-being. That means getting Cato back."

"And Annie," I added.

"And Annie," Finnick confirmed. "He'll be crucial to their rescue."

Their rescue... When was it coming? It had been... weeks? Months? I wasn't even sure anymore. "I just want him back," I whined.

"I know. I want Annie back, too."

There was nothing that either one of us could think to say after that. We had said everything that we could to each other right now. We knew that no one was going to tell us anything about Cato and the rescue was no much closer. Annie and Cato were as far away from us as they always had been. I wanted them both back - despite not knowing Annie that well - but it was still a while away. Maybe unless I said something to someone that I had seen Cato's propo.

Maybe having seen it, I could use him as leverage if they wanted me to continue being the Mockingjay. If I could push that a little bit, maybe I would be that much closer to having Cato back. He wouldn't be good when I saw him. I knew that much. He was clearly very sick and having a lot of problems there. It would take him some time to recover. But even if it meant living in the hospital wing and taking care of him, I would have been more than happy to do that, as long as it meant that I had him back.

Anything would have been better than sitting here wallowing in my own misery and waiting for Cato to arrive. It felt even worse wallowing in my pity while Cato went through absolute hell in the Capitol. The two of us stayed in silence for so long that a buck wandered into range. Somewhat carelessly, I took it down with an arrow. The hit was a little messy but good enough to put it out of its misery instantly. Finnick hauled it back to the fence.

In the hours after our trip out into the woods, I still didn't speak. By the time that dinner was served, I was sure that I had lost my voice for good. A few people tried to speak to me on the way downstairs, but I merely mumbled out tiny answers or nodded or shook my head. Most of the times I wasn't even sure what I was actually saying or motioning to them about. For a while I merely wandered around District 13 as a way for the time to pass.

When it was finally time for dinner, there was minced venison in the stew. It was much better than the junk that they normally had. A mix of tasteless vegetables and Greasy Sae's concoctions. It definitely wasn't easy to swallow it. Not when I thought about how long it had probably been since Cato had been able to eat a real meal. Eventually I gave Prim the rest of my food and listened to Katniss babble about how our nutrients weren't good enough as is, and I should have eaten what I did have.

Having had enough of Katniss's constant badgering, I left dinner early to try and get some sleep. Gale left dinner with me. He walked me back to Compartment E after we ate. When I asked him what had been going on, again there was no mention of Cato. He merely let me know about the way that the troops were moving, some traps that hadn't been working well against the Capitol troops, and the many other problems on the war front. We were slowly losing the momentum that we had gained.

Those thoughts were enough to keep me awake long into the night and not speaking with the others. In between whatever was happening to Cato, the way that it seemed that we were losing the war, and the fuzz in my brain from god-knows-what, sleep wasn't coming to me tonight. As soon as Ms. Everdeen, Prim, and Katniss were asleep, I slipped the pearl from the drawer and spent a second sleepless night clutching it in my hand, replaying Cato's words in my head.

"... ask yourself, can you trust the people you're working with? Do you know what they really want? And if you don't... find out."

Find out. What? From who? Maybe from Seneca. He was the only person that might tell me what was really going on. Even that was up in the air. He couldn't always tell me what was happening. Only when no one else could see that he was telling me the truth. And how could Cato know anything except what the Capitol told him? It was just a Capitol propo... More noise... But if Plutarch thought that it was just the Capitol line, why didn't he tell me about it? Why hadn't anyone let me or Finnick know?

Under that debate laid the real source of my distress: Cato. What had they done to him? And what were they doing to him right now? While I was sitting here, feeling all sorts of self-loathing and self-pity, my husband was going through complete hell. And knowing Cato, I knew that he would only be happy that I wasn't with him. Even now, he's still better than you. I tried to force my mind onto something else. Like how, clearly, Snow didn't buy the story that Cato and I knew nothing about the rebellion.

Unfortunately his suspicions had been reinforced, now that I had come out as the Mockingjay. Cato could only guess about the rebel tactics or make up things to tell his torturers. Lies, once discovered, would be severely punished. How abandoned by me he must feel right now. But I hadn't. I was trying so hard to continue protecting him. In his first interview, he tried to protect me from the Capitol and rebels alike, and not only had I failed to protect him, I had brought down more horrors upon him.

What a wonderful wife I was. Every day it seemed that I was only making more and more mistakes. From the day that we had first met. Getting us both to win the Games, the horror that was the Victory Tour, going back into the Games and destroying the dome, to every tiny moment in between. This entire time I was only making things worse for him and he still loved me. He still insisted that it was all worth it, just getting to know me. Did he still feel that way?

Come morning, I stuck my forearm in the wall and stared down groggily at the day's schedule. Immediately after breakfast, I was slated for Production. Wonderful... Another day to make things worse. In the dining hall, as I downed my hot grain and milk and mushy beets, I spotted a permanent communicuff on Gale's wrist, rather than the handheld one he had been using when we were out and giving back at the end of the day. A surefire sign that Coin trusted him.

"When did you get that back, Soldier Hawthorne?" I asked.

It was only halfway playful. I really did want to know. "Yesterday. They thought if I'm going to be in the field with you, it could be a backup system of communication," Gale said, not playfully at all.

He must have heard the slight edge in my voice. The two of us had both been unnaturally tense lately. Mostly because everything that we were dealing with were things that we weren't prepared for. Although I did wonder about something else. No one had ever offered me a communicuff. As far as I knew, they hadn't offered Katniss one either. I wondered, if I asked for one, would I get it? Would either one of us? Probably not. They didn't trust us. They just needed us.

"Well, I guess one of us has to be accessible," I said with an edge to my voice.

"What's that mean?" Gale asked sharply.

"Nothing. Just repeating what you said. And I totally agree that the accessible one should be you. I just hope I still have access to you as well," I told him.

We had both been speaking down into our trays. At my words, we both looked up. Our eyes locked, and I realized how furious I was with Gale. That I didn't believe for a second that he was not still angry about Cato's propo. That I felt completely betrayed that he didn't talk about it or tell me that it was okay. That he called out Cato for what he had to do. Perhaps it was because of the slap. We knew each other too well for him not to read my mood and guess what had caused it.

"Aspen -" Gale began. Already the admission of guilt was in his tone.

"Good morning," Katniss chirped, seating herself down on my other side. Without giving her a chance to say anything else, I got up and turned to leave the table. "Goodbye."

"You know what it is," Gale's voice floated behind me.

"Damn," Katniss hissed.

They both knew how furious I was about everything that had happened. They both knew how upset I was that no one would talk to me about what was happening with Cato. Unwilling to listen to them try and defend themselves, I grabbed my tray, crossed to the deposit area, and slammed the dishes onto the rack. It splattered everywhere. By the time that I was in the hallway, both Gale and Katniss had caught up with me.

"Why didn't you say something?" Gale asked, taking my arm.

"Why didn't I?" I jerked my arm free. Now I realized that Gale still had a slight red mark on his face from my slap. "Why didn't you, Gale? And I did, by the way, when I asked you last night about what had been going on!"

"I'm sorry. All right? I didn't know what to do. I wanted to tell you, but everyone was afraid that seeing Cato's propo would make you sick. I knew that it did. I saw how awful you looked."

"They were right. It did. But not quite as sick as you lying to me for Coin." At that moment, his communicuff started beeping. Unable to stop myself, I sneered, "There she is. Better run. You have things to tell her."

It was absolutely the wrong thing to say. Just like when I had slapped him yesterday, I knew that I should have told him that I was sorry and taken it back. But I couldn't. Because I did mean it and I was hurt that he treated being close with Coin as more important than acting like my best friend. For a moment, real hurt registered on his face. It was something that I hadn't seen often. Then a cold anger replaced it. That was more familiar to me. He turned on his heel and went.

A moment later Katniss appeared at my side. "Why don't you have one?" I asked her, noting the absence on her wrist.

"Are you kidding? They trust me to follow their orders about as much as they trust you," Katniss explained.

"I suppose that's true." The two of us stood in silence for a little while as I folded my arms over my chest. "Cat... What do you think they're doing to him?" I asked softly.

Katniss let out a little breath, my indication that the answer that she was going to give me was not going to be the one that I wanted. "Honestly, Aspen, I don't think that you want to know what I think they're doing to him," Katniss whispered.

"He's getting worse. They - They need to help him," I choked.

"Just keep working with them, Aspen. They're going to get him back. I promise," Katniss said, grabbing my hands.

"I just hate thinking about what he's going through there."

"He'll be okay."

But there was something about the way that she said it that made me nervous. Like she didn't even believe herself. "Are you so sure about that?" I asked sharply.

"He knows that you're alive. He's going to be fighting to get back to you," Katniss promised.

But there was something in his eyes that made me feel like he wasn't even fighting anymore. There was something in his eyes that told me that he barely even knew who I was. It was almost like he was reading off of one of those teleprompter things that they had in the Capitol. It seemed like he was being hypnotized. So desperately I wanted to be there, trying to tell him that I hadn't given up on him and that I was still getting him back. I had just hit another road block.

"Yeah. I suppose," I mumbled dumbly, wanting to think of anything else. "So you saw it?"

"Most of us saw it in Command," Katniss said. So most of them had seen it. I knew that they were lying to me. "They managed to get Cato's family out in time. They didn't want them to see what he looks like."

"I understand that," I muttered.

There was a good chance that Cato's family would have marched on the Capitol themselves if they'd seen what he looked like. "He doesn't look that horrible," Katniss tried.

"Are you serious?" I snapped.

"He's still alive, Aspen. That's just what you have to keep telling yourself," Katniss whispered.

"For how much longer?" I asked glumly.

"As long as they know that you're seeing him."

"They didn't want me to see him? The people in Command, did they?"

"No. They were too concerned that you would do something rash."

Snorting under my breath, I shook my head. They were wrong. I wasn't strong or healthy or sane enough to do something right now. Not with everything that was happening. Honestly I couldn't even walk for that long without getting lightheaded. I wasn't sure if it was still from the remnants of the concussion, the explosions in District 8, or if it was just because I was so overwhelmed with everything that had been happening. Maybe it was a little bit of everything.

"Well look at that. I've seen what he looks like and I haven't done anything rash yet," I growled.

Because you can barely think straight without passing out. "Because you know that you have to keep it a secret," Katniss reminded me. "Finnick was right to tell you to not say anything. They would only be inclined to realize that you were still working for your own motivations."

"They're right. I have to try and not say anything. For a while," I said weakly.

"Play your cards right," Katniss advised.

"Play my cards right," I repeated.

We were silent for a little while. "I'm so sorry that this happened to you," Katniss finally said.

It was the same thing that I had heard at least a hundred people tell me. "But it did. My only chance is to keep moving forward. I can't go back. I can't change having the rebels rescue me first, blowing out the force field, allowing Cato to volunteer, playing the suicide trick in the first Games, or volunteering for Prim. It took me a long time to realize that I can't change any of that. My only choice is to go forward and try and change the outcome," I explained slowly.

"Good. That's a good thing to realize," Katniss said, grabbing my hands. She pulled me into a hug for a moment before releasing me and stepping back. "Cato's family doesn't know about his latest broadcast. To keep their minds in the war, they want to keep it from them."

"I figured. Just like they wanted to do with me," I said lowly.

"Yes." Katniss glanced around and shook her head. "We shouldn't talk about this out here. It's not safe. Someone might hear us."

"Alright."

"We should get you to Remake," Katniss said.

Right... I had almost forgotten that I was supposed to go there today. "Doesn't seem right to go there," I said.

"I know. But we have to."

"Okay." The two of us started walking down the hallways. "Think Gale will get over it?" I asked after a beat.

Katniss looked almost surprised at my words. She let out a soft breath and shook her head. "After everything that's happened... I don't think that he'll ever just get over it," Katniss said. I nodded, glad that she had at least told me the truth. "But he's hurt at your insinuation that Coin's trust means more to him than yours does."

"That's what he makes it seem like sometimes," I scoffed.

Katniss let out a soft breathy laugh. "You two are too hotheaded for your own good," she said.

Yes, I was hotheaded. So was Gale. So was Cato. So was Katniss. So were all of the people in my life. But we all somehow worked together. "Would you believe that Cato balances me out?" I asked.

"A year and a half ago? No. Now? Yes."

A small smile popped up on both of our faces. "Thanks," I almost laughed.

"I'm only telling you the truth."

We walked in silence for a little longer. "Do you agree with me? About Gale?" I asked.

"We really shouldn't tell him about this. He'd never get over it," Katniss said.

"I'm not telling him," I said quickly.

Where it was concerned, I tried to keep Gale and Cato as far apart as I possibly could. "Gale's way too involved with the war. He's even more involved than you, and that's saying something considering that you're the Mockingjay. But he's willing to do anything to win it. Sacrifice anyone. Outside of our own families. That means Cato. You know that he loves you. Cato is another story," Katniss explained gently but truthfully.

And I knew that what she was saying was the truth. If it meant winning the war, Gale would easily let Cato die. "I wish they liked each other," I muttered.

"We'd be in a very different position right now if they did," Katniss explained.

If nothing else, at least we would probably have Cato back. "I know. This is the wrong thing to be talking about. My relationship status and the severity of hatred between the two men that mean the most to me in the world," I said.

"Sometimes we need some sense of normalcy to keep from going insane."

"When did you get smarter than me?" I teased.

We both laughed. It was the first time that I had laughed in a while. There was something nice about getting to laugh with Katniss. We didn't get to do it too often anymore. Together we walked over towards Remake. I didn't want to do anything today but I knew that I would have to, as it happened so often. On the way over there, as people were around and we couldn't discuss Gale or Cato, I thought back on a fonder memory. The night before the Quell.

Hours had passed since the two of us had said goodnight to each other. Neither one of us had actually gone to sleep, but we had barely said two words to each other. Despite that, I knew that Cato was awake, just the way that he likely knew that I was awake. We really needed to go to sleep, but neither one of us could bring ourselves to do just that. I didn't want to sleep through what would likely be the last few hours of my life. So I just laid awake and enjoyed the feel of Cato's fingers gently running over my bare leg.

It had to be closing in on three in the morning when I finally couldn't stand the silence any longer. "Cato?" I called into the darkness softly.

"It was nice while it lasted," Cato sighed.

"Stop," I snapped.

Cato smiled softly and leaned up on his elbows. I pulled the sheet a little tighter around my chest as Cato brushed my knotted hair off of my forehead. "What is it?" Cato asked.

"Were you sleeping?" I asked curiously.

"No. You know that I wasn't sleeping."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm not going to sleep until you're asleep," Cato said bullheadedly.

"I can't sleep."

"Try."

"You need your sleep."

"So do you."

That was very true that I did need to sleep. We both really needed to sleep. There was a good chance that the morning would bring all sorts of horrors. In fact, I knew that the morning would bring new horrors. But that didn't mean that I could sleep. I was too busy thinking about everything else that was happening. I was too busy thinking about the kind of life that Cato would have now that I would finally be out of it.

"I'm not tired. I feel... antsy," I said slowly.

"For tomorrow?" Cato asked. I nodded. "I'd be surprised if you weren't." Even though I knew that he wanted me to go to sleep, I couldn't. "Alright, don't sleep tonight. You'll have plenty of time to catch up on sleep once you're back here."

"I hate you for volunteering," I muttered.

"I know," Cato sighed.

No matter what, I really did hate Cato for doing what he had. He was the single best person in my entire life. He was the person that meant the world to me. But that didn't mean that I didn't hate him for what he had done. Cato leaned up, pressing me down into the soft bed, and leaned down over me. I tried to push him back but he merely grabbed me, pulled me so that I was laying on his chest, and pressed a kiss against my forehead. A single tear from my eye fell down onto his bare chest.

"It's okay. I'll always be here," Cato whispered.

He pressed the heel of his palm against my upper chest, wrapping his fingers over my shoulder. "Promise?" I asked weakly.

"Promise."

The two of us laid in silence for a while as our legs knotted together. "When's the last time that you were happy?" I asked, falling onto his side and pressing a hand on his chest.

"Last time?" Cato repeated, thinking for a moment. "Right now. With you."

How could he be happy with everything that was happening? I didn't understand how he could possibly be happy. I wasn't completely happy. I couldn't even remember the last time that I was completely happy. I wasn't sure if I ever had been. But this was probably the closest that I had ever been to being happy. These moments, when I was alone with Cato. The moments that I was with my husband and not thinking about the future. I supposed that right now I was reasonably happy.

But that wouldn't last that long. "What do you think is going to happen in the arena?" I asked.

"Why all of the questions?" Cato shot back.

"I don't know. I like thinking about the Games. It keeps me from thinking about what comes after. Just focus on one thing at a time."

"I'll tell you what happens after the Games," Cato offered. I nodded for him to explain. "You get to go home. Be with your family. Love them and have the life with them that you haven't gotten to enjoy yet."

No... "What about -?"

"Go to bed," Cato ordered, leaving no room for argument. "We both need our rest for the morning."

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything," I mumbled.

"Don't apologize," Cato said, running a hand back over the dip in my spine. "Never apologize for anything."

"Even for having you meet me?" I asked.

"That was the best moment of my life," Cato said.

The smile on his face told me that he wasn't kidding. He was completely serious. I let out a soft breath as I tucked myself a little further into Cato's chest and pressed a kiss against the bare skin there. These were the moments that I felt the safest. This was my happy place. I could feel Cato tightening his grip against me protectively. It was almost painful, but I said nothing. Because I couldn't be sure how much longer that I would get to do this with him.

The memory made me completely heartsick for Cato. Although most things made me pretty heartsick for Cato. Just living made me feel that way. I missed the days that the two of us could just be together. Those nights that we had spent together where we didn't need words. We just needed to know that we had each other. Just the way that I had once had that kind of bond with Gale. The bond that I so desperately missed. The one that constantly seemed to be on the rocks.

Maybe I had been too spiteful, not given him enough time to explain. Maybe everyone was just trying to protect me by lying to me. But I didn't care. I was sick of people lying to me for my own good. Because really it was mostly for their own good. Lie to Aspen about the rebellion so she doesn't do anything crazy. Send her into the arena without a clue so we can fish her out. Don't tell her about Cato's propo because it might make her sick, and it's hard enough to get a decent performance out of her as it is.

They were right about one thing. I did feel sick. This time it wasn't because of the concussion or injuries sustained in Eight. This was something much worse. Something that wouldn't heal with time. I was heartsick. And too tired for a day of production. But I was already at Remake with Katniss, so I went in. Today, I discovered, we would be returning to District 12. As if this day couldn't get any worse. Cressida wanted to do unscripted interviews with Gale, Katniss, and me throwing light on our demolished city.

"If you're all up for that," Cressida said, looking closely at my face.

"Count me in," I said.

It would have been better than standing here and pretending I hadn't seen Cato's propo. At least in Twelve I could get some distance. I stood, uncommunicative and stiff, a mannequin, as my Prep Team dressed me, did my hair, and dabbed makeup on my face. Not enough to show, only enough to take the edge off the circles under my sleepless eyes. It was not an easy task. It took my Prep Team at least twenty minutes to fix them. The hollowed cheeks and eyes were another thing entirely.

As per usual, no one spoke to me while I watched myself being dolled up again. No one ever really spoke to me unless it was to give me an order or tell me something that I was doing wrong. I was grateful that today Katniss was getting some makeup put on her too. If anyone had been sleeping as little as I had, it was her. She was clearly a great deal bothered by everything that had happened. She still felt the guilt from Prim being Reaped all that time ago.

Between the three of us, it really could be traced back to exactly the moment that the rebellion had first begun. That fateful moment that Prim's name had been pulled by Effie's gloved hand. The moment that I had fought Katniss so hard to go into the Games. How different would things be if she hadn't done that? I wasn't sure. Maybe nothing would have changed. As I exchanged a little glance with her, I could tell that she was thinking the same thing; the same thing that we so often thought of.

Once we were both done getting ourselves to look slightly more human, Boggs escorted the two of us down to the Hangar, but we didn't talk beyond a preliminary greeting. He never had really enjoyed speaking. Only to say what was absolutely necessary and then be silent. I was grateful to be spared another exchange about my disobedience in Eight, especially since his mask - from Gale's unfortunate broken nose incident - looked so uncomfortable.

At the last moment, I remembered to send a message to Ms. Everdeen and Alana about my leaving Thirteen, and stressed that it wouldn't be dangerous. Neither one of them looked very happy that we were leaving anyways. I knew that they didn't like the thought that I was leaving Thirteen for even a moment. They all knew that I was endangering my own life the moment that I left the little underground container. But, honestly, I didn't think that my life was worth all too much right now.

Either way, I had managed to convince them both that we would be safe during the trip. And it seemed that it really would be completely safe. We all headed away and boarded a hovercraft for the short ride to Twelve. I was directed to a seat at a table where Plutarch, Gale, Katniss, Dean, Skye, and Cressida were poring over a map. The rest of my team wasn't far away. Julie wasn't happy that she couldn't come to Twelve, but, just in case, we couldn't have someone with a broken foot with us.

Plutarch was brimming with satisfaction as he showed me the before/after effects of the first couple of propos. The rebels, who were barely maintaining a foothold in several Districts, had rallied. They had actually taken Three and Eleven - the latter so crucial since it was Panem's main food supplier - and had made inroads in several other Districts as well. Right now it seemed that Two was the only District that we hadn't made any headway with. That would take Cato to take them.

"Hopeful. Very hopeful indeed. Fulvia's going to have the first round of We Remember spots ready tonight, so we can target the individual Districts with their dead," Plutarch explained.

"Sending out the memoriams of the dead Tributes from each of the Districts?" I asked.

"Yes. Finnick's absolutely marvelous," Plutarch said.

"It's painful to watch, actually. He knew so many of them personally," Cressida said.

My stomach lurched painfully. Of course, this must have been terribly hard on him. "That's what makes it so effective. Straight from the heart. You're all doing beautifully. Coin could not be more pleased," Plutarch said.

"Glad to hear it," I said, feeling very close to spilling my guts.

But there was something else that was bothering me. Gale didn't tell them, then. I wasn't sure whether or not he was going to rat me out. I had a feeling that he wouldn't. At least, I had hoped that he wouldn't. I hoped that he was still my best friend. It seemed that he was. He was allowing my pretending not to see Cato and my anger at their cover-up. But I guessed that it was too little, too late, because I still couldn't let it go. It didn't matter. He wasn't speaking to me, either.

It was something that I would just have to get used to in the coming weeks. They were only going to speak to me when it was absolutely necessary. So I walked around the hovercraft aimlessly for a little while. I didn't want to sit still. I noticed that there were a few other people lingering around that I recognized from Thirteen. And I spotted Skye and Dean on the far end of the hovercraft. I was right before. Julie wasn't with them, probably because of her foot. I slowly walked up to them.

"No Julie?" I asked curiously.

Dean and Skye both turned to me, smiling slightly. "Foot isn't entirely healed. They asked her to sit today out so that she can go on the next real mission," Dean explained.

"I'll tell her about everything," Skye said.

"They'll see it, I'm sure. You're all coming along, then?" I asked.

Dean and Skye exchanged another look before nodding. "Let's see Cato's wife's home," Dean said.

"It's not really... home, anymore," I mumbled dumbly.

They both shook their heads as they walked back up to me. Dean grabbed my hands gently and tugged me into him. "It's always going to be home, Aspen. It might take some time to get it back to the way that it was, but it'll be your home again," Dean said softly. "If you're willing to make it that way."

"Maybe after everything is over," I muttered.

"Are you okay going back?" Skye asked.

Was I even okay to be alive? Not really. But it wasn't like I had much of a choice right now. I just had to do what they wanted. "Have to be. Would you be okay going back to Two?" I responded.

Skye and Dean exchanged a pained look. "I'll let you know if I ever go back," Skye said softly.

"You alright, Aspen?" Dean asked carefully.

"Alive," I said.

"Don't look too good," Dean said.

He reached out a hand to press it against my forehead to check my temperature, but I waved him off. "Haven't been sleeping that well," I explained.

"You could try getting some of that sleeping medicine from the hospital," Skye suggested.

That would have been worse than just dealing with the way that I felt. It was miserable. "No. If I do that they're going to make me start undergoing even more psychiatric evaluations. Plus those things give me nightmares and hallucinations. They're bad enough without them," I said flippantly.

"We understand," Dean said. The three of us were silent for a little while before he spoke again. "Is everything okay between you and Gale?"

"Not really. Things haven't been okay with us since..." I trailed off awkwardly, realizing that I was speaking to Cato's brother and best friend.

"Since Cato," Skye put together.

"Yeah. We'll get over it. We always do. I'll - uh - I'll see you when we get to Twelve," I stuttered.

"Try and sleep for a few minutes," Dean said, patting my shoulder.

"Sure," I mumbled.

Sleeping sounded pretty good. Actually, it sounded much better than talking to my husband's best friend and brother about my best friend and quasi-romance. What could I even count Gale as? A boyfriend? He had never really been that to me before. It was too late. Best friend? Always. A crush? There was a good chance that I had had a crush on him before. I just hadn't noticed. Mostly because Gale was always so nonchalant about things. Cato had always been so bold.

As I dropped back into the chair that I had been in before, I realized that I couldn't force myself to go to sleep, even though I had gotten less than five hours of sleep in the last few days. Instead I merely leaned on Katniss's shoulder. The two of us intertwined fingers as we sat pressed up against each other. It took me until we had almost arrived at District 12 to realize something. Katniss hadn't seen Twelve since it had been bombed. This might have been even worse for her.

The two of us sat with our hands linked for a long time, not speaking, as we so often did. We never needed to talk. There was just something about the way that we could look at each other and instantly know what the other was thinking. We both seemed to notice something else at the same moment. It wasn't until we landed in the Meadow that I realized that someone else was missing. Haymitch wasn't among our company.

When I asked Plutarch about his absence, he just shook his head and said, "He couldn't face it."

"Haymitch? Not able to face something? Wanted a day off, more likely," I said.

"I think his actual words were 'I couldn't face it without a bottle,'" Plutarch said.

Well that was exactly how I was feeling right now. I rolled my eyes, long out of patience with my Mentor, his weakness for drink, and what he can or can't confront. There were lots of things that I felt that I couldn't confront. Being back in Twelve for the first time, the hospital in Eight, and all of the other moments in between. But I had managed them all without a drink. Although I had needed sleeping medication for most of the time since the destruction of the arena.

But about five minutes after my return to Twelve, I was wishing that I had a bottle myself. Maybe I was no stronger than Haymitch. I thought that I had come to terms with Twelve's demise - heard of it, seen it from the air, and wandered through its ashes. So why did everything bring on a fresh pang of grief? Was I simply too out of it before to fully register the loss of my world? I couldn't be sure, but it was even worse being here all over again.

Or was it maybe the look on Gale's face as he took in the destruction on foot that made the atrocity feel brand-new? Maybe it was because this time I couldn't just push away my own thoughts. I had to watch the others. I saw how horrified both Gale and Katniss looked. They had watched it happen, but now they had to face the aftermath, just like I had. I saw the looks of pity that were being sent my way by Skye and Dean. They were finally seeing just how bad things were in my life.

More than once it seemed like one of them was going to reach out and touch me or maybe ask me if I was okay. But they didn't. Probably because they knew that I wouldn't appreciate that. We all just wandered through the ashes. I wondered how much Dean and Skye would tell the rest of the Hadley's and Julie. Cressida eventually directed the team to start with me at my old house. Dean and Skye stared at the little shack in surprise. Were they trying to imagine Cato and I living here? I was.

"What do you want me to do?" I asked blankly.

"Whatever you feel like," Cressida said.

Standing back in the kitchen, I didn't feel like doing anything. Actually, it wasn't much of a kitchen. The only thing that it contained was a little counter. I awkwardly wandered through the ruins of the old house, wishing so desperately that I was back here with Gale and Katniss, making fun of the Capitol. The only thing that I did was very briefly touch the hole in the wall where the hook that used to hold my father's hunting jacket had been knocked out by the firebombs.

The film that Cressida and the rest of the team would be dreadfully boring. But it would drive a point home. That even I - the Mockingjay - wasn't impervious to the pain of the rebellion. That I was, indeed, human. That there was a life that I missed. There was nothing that I felt like doing right now. I just wanted to stare off into space. So that was what I did. In fact, I found myself focusing up at the sky - the only roof left - because too many memories were drowning me.

After a while, Cressida said, "That's fine, Aspen. Let's move on."

That was all that I really wanted. I was sick of standing here and pretending that I wasn't affected by the presence of my own home. Trying to pretend that I wasn't imagining the future that could have been. The future where Cato and I could have lived together in District 12 for the rest of our lives. Where we could have had a family that wouldn't have been afraid to be Reaped into the Games. Maybe a daughter and son... The only person that I could have ever seen that kind of a future with.

Blinking back the vision of Cato and I with our make-believe children, our large group headed next door to Katniss's house. It was another place that I didn't want to be, and one that looked even more painful for her. It was the first time in a long time that I had genuinely seen her crying. For a while I held her hand and stood in the middle of her decrepit home. She merely tucked her head into my shoulder, wetting my District 13 uniform with her tears.

Almost half an hour passed before Katniss was able to pull herself together and tell everyone what had happened. She was asked by Cressida to do a quick recap of where certain rooms were. What had happened in each of them. She even recounted her movements from the morning of the Reaping that sent me into the first Games. I could tell that Cressida was trying to rush everything from Katniss to make it easier on her. Katniss herself could barely bring herself to speak.

Gale didn't get off so easily at his old address. Cressida filmed him in silence for a few minutes, just as she had done with us, but just as he pulled the one remnant of his previous life from the ashes - a twisted metal poker - she started to question him about his family, his job, and life in the Seam. She made him go back to the night of the firebombing and reenact it, starting at his house, working his way down across the Meadow and through the woods to the lake.

It wasn't easy, but Gale somehow managed it. I straggled behind the film crew and the bodyguards, feeling their presence to be a violation of my beloved woods. This was a private place, a sanctuary, already corrupted by the Capitol's evil. Even after we had left behind the charred stumps near the fence, we were still tripping over decomposing bodies. They had actually made it out here to die. My once safe-haven was their place of death. Did we have to record it for everyone to see?

After a little while, we turned the tables to Dean and Skye. Being District 2 citizens, they had never been in District 12 before. This was their first moment to see the place where Cato's wife had grown up. At least, what had become of it. I could tell that it was not easy for them to speak. They didn't want to speak poorly of the place where I had grown up but they also didn't want to downplay the horrors of what had happened here.

For a while Cressida had me walk them around District 12 and explain what everything was. It was not easy for me. I had an extremely hard time recounting where their best friend and brother's wife had grown up. But I managed to point out the places to them. Everything from the place where Peeta had saved Katniss and I from starving to death to the old school to the chain link fence where my parents' graves were marked. I was torn over whether or not I was happy to see that they were still there.

After a while we wandered back towards the Town Square. "So I wanna start with you in front of the Justice Building, okay?" Cressida asked. I nodded blankly. She then turned to Messalla, motioning to the destroyed Justice Building. "Bang. First shot."

The Justice Building... It was the place where so many things had changed for me. I had become a Tribute for the first time here. The real change in my life. Everyone hung back while I stumbled up to it. It was almost impossible to walk over the destroyed buildings, the bodies of those who had died during the firebombs, and simply dealing with the shaking of my knees. Cressida raised her camera and motioned for me to turn back to her. I did so, holding my bow dumbly.

"Aspen, tell us what happened here," Cressida called.

What had happened? I wasn't really sure. I tried not to listen. "I - I don't..." I muttered.

Gale, as usual, was the one who stepped in to save me from having to say anything. "We were all standing right here watching the Games when you fired that arrow," Gale started. We all stared at him, realizing that he was the one who would explain what had happened that day. It was the most that I had ever heard him speak in front of a camera. "The screens just went dark. Nobody had any idea what happened. Peacekeepers forced us back into our homes.

"For maybe an hour, the town was just dead quiet. Little past nine we heard their trucks pulling out. All of them, every single Peacekeeper. And I knew what that meant. Me and a couple of guys from the mines, we started pulling people from their houses and tried to get 'em to the fence line but a lot of people were scared of the forest. So they headed up onto the road. Make a break for it that way," Gale said, pointing off into the distance.

Cressida turned to Pollux as he was filming. "Stay with Gale," she whispered.

We all started moving slowly. I felt my stomach churn into knots as we continued walking. I had already heard this story. I had heard it from Gale and Katniss and I had heard it from some of the survivors. I didn't want to have to hear it again. Katniss's hand wrapped around mine as she slowly pulled me along with everyone else. Gale started walking through the rubble of District 12, while the rest of the team followed behind him.

"Nine hundred and fifteen of us made it to the fence," Gale mumbled. "Then we watched as bombers circled back towards the road. They firebombed them as they ran away."

That number echoed in my head for a long while. That was more than the people who had made it to District 13. There were only a little over eight hundred people from District 12 who had made it to Thirteen. What had happened to those nearly one hundred extra people? I could take a guess, but that wasn't something that I really wanted to think about. Enough people had died in the rebellion already, I didn't want to think of anyone else on top of that.

Our large group stopped at the sight of all of the corpses littering the road ahead of us. Gale continued speaking, not taking his eyes off of the dead friends. "Nine hundred and fifteen out of ten thousand. I should've grabbed people, I should've dragged them with me. Some of the kids I could've carried," Gale said.

Survivor's guilt. I knew the feeling. "You saved so many people, Gale. Without you, there would be no District 12. Not even the memory of it," Cressida told him. "You, too, Katniss."

"We could have done more," Katniss whispered.

They shouldn't have even been forced into that position. I was the one who should have done less. As the two of them exchanged a long glance I realized that this was the first time that I had really heard Gale speak about the day that Twelve was destroyed. Ms. Everdeen, some of the Capitol refugees, and Thirteen officials had mostly told me the stories. Gale and Katniss's explanations had only been brief. Since that day, Katniss couldn't even bring herself to speak about that day.

At some point we headed back to the woods. By the time that we reached the lake, hours later, Gale seemed to have lost his ability to speak. The way that Katniss seemed to have lost hers before we had even left Thirteen. Everyone was dripping in sweat - especially Castor and Pollux in their insect shells - and Cressida called for a break. I scooped up handfuls of water from the lake, wishing I could dive in and surface alone and naked and unobserved. I wandered around the perimeter for a while.

For a moment it felt like I was on watch and we were back in the Games. I supposed that, in a way, we had never really left the Games. Not since the first time around. I could hear the others chatting softly back by the rocks, but they didn't speak too loudly. No one wanted to shatter the relative peace around here. I fiddled with the ring that was hanging from the chain around my neck, wishing that Cato could be here. I had always wanted him to see our Meadow...

When I came back around to the little concrete house beside the lake, that I had met Bonnie and Twill in so long ago, I paused in the doorway and saw Gale propping the crooked poker he salvaged against the wall by the hearth. For a moment I had an image of a lone stranger, sometime far in the future, wandering lost in the wilderness and coming upon this small place of refuge, with the pile of split logs, the hearth, the poker. Wondering how it came to be.

Just the way that I had wondered time and time again who used to live here. Had they been just as unhappy and hurt as I was? Gale turned and met my eyes and I knew that he was thinking about our last meeting here. When we fought over whether or not to run away. If we had, would District 12 still be there? I thought that it would. But the Capitol would still be in control of Panem as well. And I wouldn't have even gotten a week of being Cato's wife, a selfish, but true high point of my life.

Cheese sandwiches were passed around at lunch and we ate them in the shade of the trees. I intentionally sat at the far edge of the group, next to Pollux, so I didn't have to talk. No one was talking much, really. Dean and Skye were talking a little bit with the others, who were mostly explaining what it was like to live in District 12. The only person who hadn't uttered so much as a word since we had left the Town Square was Katniss - save myself and Pollux.

In the relative quiet, the birds took back the woods. I nudged Pollux with my elbow and pointed out a small black bird with a crown. It had been a while since I had seen one of them. The bird hopped to a new branch, momentarily opening its wings, showing off its white patches. Just the way that the underside of my dress had once made me the same thing. Pollux gestured to my pin and raised his eyebrows questioningly.

I nodded, confirming it was a Mockingjay. "Yeah, that's a Mockingjay."

To my surprise, Pollux tilted his head upwards and let out something akin to a whistle. It was just ever-so-slightly garbled from his being an Avox. But I hadn't even thought that he was able to make noise. I thought that their tongues were cut out. Instead it seemed that it was just mutilated enough so that he couldn't speak. As the single Mockingjay and the rest of the flock began repeating the whistle, I realized that it was mimicking the three-note whistle that Rue had taught me during the first Games.

"Well, now they'll never shut up," Gale said.

The way that he spoke almost made me smile. It sounded just a touch like Gale was back to his normal self. But I knew that he was far from it. We all were. I turned back to Pollux and held up one finger to say 'Wait, I'll show you,' and whistled a bird call of my own. Something that didn't remind me of my dead friend. One of many... The Mockingjay, as usual, cocked its head to the side for a moment and then whistled the call right back at me.

Then, to my surprise, Pollux whistled a few more notes of his own. The bird answered him immediately. Pollux's face broke into an expression of delight and he had a series of melodic exchanges with the Mockingjay. My guess was that it was the first conversation that he had had in years. Music drew Mockingjay's like blossoms do bees, and in a short while he got half a dozen of them perched in the branches over our heads. He tapped me on the arm and used a twig to write a word in the dirt.

SING?

"You want me to sing?" I asked.

Pollux nodded with a small smile. Usually, I would have declined, but it was kind of impossible to say no to Pollux, given the circumstances. Besides, the Mockingjay's song voices were different from their whistles, and I would like him to hear them. So, before I actually thought about what I was doing, I sang Rue's four notes, the ones she used to signal the end of the workday in Eleven. Just the way that Pollux had just done. The notes that ended up as the background music to her murder.

The birds didn't know that. They picked up the simple phrase and bounced it back and forth between them in sweet harmony. The song was almost peaceful. Just like the day that I first showed Cato the whistle - the one that he thought was so clever that we used to draw the Careers out. The one that led to Rue's death. Just as they did in the Hunger Games before the muttations broke through the trees, chased us onto the Cornucopia, and slowly gnawed Coral to a bloody pulp.

"Want to hear them do a real song?" I burst out.

Anything to stop those memories. They were a nightmare. But not just a nightmare. This didn't end when I closed my eyes. The memories only got even worse when I closed my eyes. Everyone was now watching me as I moved with more of a purpose than I had in a long time. Pollux nodded gleefully. I was on my feet within the minute, moving back into the trees, resting my hand on the rough trunk of a maple where the birds were perched, staring down at me, waiting.

My voice was suddenly clogged in my throat. I hadn't sung 'The Hanging Tree' out loud for ten years, because it was forbidden, but I remembered every word. I prayed for just a moment that Snow might hear my words somehow. A memory of our dances. A memory of that first dance before the first Games with my warning. I can promise you a show. But don't say that I didn't warn you that you wouldn't like it. All to show him that his moves hadn't been lost on me, and mine wouldn't be lost on him.

Even now I could remember the look that Snow had given me that first dance. I remembered that the words weren't being played with the forbidden song. But they were echoing loudly in my head that time and for all of the dances afterwards. It was his warning to me and this would be my warning to him. That I remembered what he did and I didn't plan to ever forget. I began softly, sweetly, as Mr. Everdeen did.

"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man they say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."

For a while, everything became silent. The Mockingjay's were suddenly aware that something new was coming. The wind blew through my hair softly as I stared at the lake. Pollux looked up into the sky and smiled as the Mockingjay's began to alter their songs as they became aware of my new offering. I very slowly turned towards Pollux and smiled back at him. On my other side, Cressida nudged Castor on the arm.

"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out for his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."

Everyone was staring at me. Gale and Katniss were both giving me scrutinizing stares. Katniss's was longing. She was likely remembering her father singing this very song. My voice threatened to falter at all of the attention, but I knew that I couldn't stop with everyone listening to me. Besides everyone else, I had the birds' attention now. In one more verse, surely they would have completely captured the melody, as it was simple and repeated four times with little variation.

"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."

Dean and Skye were staring at me with sad eyes. Ultimately everyone dropped their eyes, unable to look at each other any longer. By now there was a hush in the trees. Just the rustle of leaves in the breeze. For a moment my voice almost faltered. It was silent. There were no birds, Mockingjay or other. Cato was right. They did fall silent when I sang. Just as they did for Mr. Everdeen and Katniss. Just as silent as that night on the roof.

"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."

The birds waited for me to continue. But that was it. Last verse. In the stillness I remembered the scene. I was home from a day in the woods with Mr. Everdeen and Katniss. Sitting on the floor with Prim, who was just a toddler, singing 'The Hanging Tree.' Making us necklaces out of scraps of old rope like it said in the song, not knowing the real meaning of the words. The tune was simple and easy to harmonize to, though, and back then I could memorize almost anything set to music after a round or two.

Suddenly, Ms. Everdeen snatched the rope necklaces away and was yelling at Mr. Everdeen. Katniss started to cry because Ms. Everdeen never yelled, and then Prim was wailing and Katniss ran outside to hide. I followed, trying to make sure that she didn't get hurt. As Katniss had exactly one hiding spot - in the Meadow under a honeysuckle bush - both Mr. Everdeen and I found her immediately. He helped me calm her down and told us everything was fine, only that we had better not sing that song anymore.

But we hadn't understood. And that was something that we had always wanted to understand. Ms. Everdeen had just wanted us to forget it. So, of course, every word was immediately, irrevocably branded into our brains. We didn't sing it anymore, Mr. Everdeen, Katniss, and I, or even speak of it. We had only written it down to ensure that we would never forget it. After he died, it used to come back to me a lot. Being older, I began to understand the lyrics.

At the beginning, it sounded like a guy was trying to get his girlfriend to secretly meet up with him at midnight. But it was an odd place for a tryst, a hanging tree, where a man was hung for murder. The murderer's lover must have had something to do with the killing, or maybe they were just going to punish her anyway, because his corpse called out for her to flee. That was weird obviously, the talking-corpse bit, but it wasn't until the third verse that 'The Hanging Tree' began to get unnerving.

You realized that the singer of the song was the dead murderer. He was still in the hanging tree. And even though he told his lover to flee, he kept asking if she was coming to meet him. The phrase 'Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free' was the most troubling because at first you thought that he was talking about when he told her to flee, presumably to safety. But then you wondered if he meant for her to run to him. To death.

It was something that I had frequently thought about in the early days of Cato's disappearance. Wondering whether or not death would be more peaceful. If the two of us could have been together at our own hanging tree. It was the first time that I had ever really thought that the murderer might have been in the right. In the final stanza, it was clear that having his lover come to him in death was what he was waiting for. His lover, with her rope necklace, hanging dead next to him in the tree.

Almost a peaceful thought... I used to think the murderer was the creepiest guy imaginable. Now, with a couple of trips to the Hunger Games under my belt, I decided not to judge him without knowing more details. Maybe his lover was already sentenced to death and he was trying to make it easier. To let her know that he would be waiting for her. Or maybe he thought that the place he was leaving her was really worse than death.

Didn't I want to kill Cato with that syringe to save him from the Capitol? It was the first thing that I had thought of. I had instantly jumped to the most violent conclusion that I could think of - as long as it meant that we could be together. Was that really my only option? Probably not, but I couldn't think of another at the time. Maybe there was a good chance that I was more like the murderer than I had ever thought. Maybe I was exactly like him.

At the end of the day I guessed that Ms. Everdeen thought that the whole thing was too twisted for a nine and seven-year-old, though. Especially the ones who made their own rope necklaces. It wasn't like hanging was something that only happened in a story. Plenty of people were executed that way in Twelve. You could bet that she didn't want us singing it in front of our music classes. She probably wouldn't have liked me doing it here for Pollux even, but at least I wasn't - wait, no, I was wrong.

As I glanced sideways, I saw that Castor had been taping me the entire time. Just as I had seen before, everyone was watching me intently. And Pollux had tears running down his cheeks, probably because no doubt my freaky song had dredged up some terrible incident in his life. Great. I sighed and leaned back against the trunk. That was when the Mockingjay's began their own rendition of 'The Hanging Tree,' much louder than I had. In their mouths, it was quite beautiful.

Conscious of being filmed, I stood quietly until I heard Cressida call, "Cut!"

Plutarch crossed to me, laughing. "Where do you come up with this stuff? No one would believe it if we made it up!" He threw an arm around me and kissed me on the top of my head with a loud smack. "You're golden!"

Trying to push back the thought of throwing his arm off of me, I merely said, "I wasn't doing it for the cameras."

And it was the truth. I had done it because Pollux had asked. "Lucky they were on, then. Come on, everybody, back to town!" Plutarch called out.

Just like that, the Mockingjay's dropped off. As we trudged back through the woods, we reached a boulder, and Katniss, Gale, and I turned our heads in the same direction, like a pack of dogs catching a scent on the wind. Cressida noticed and asked what laid that way. We admitted, without acknowledging any of the other, that it was our old hunting rendezvous place. She wanted to see it, even after we told her that it was nothing really. Nothing but a place where I was happy, I thought.

Our rock ledge overlooking the valley. Perhaps a little less green than usual, but the blackberry bushes hung heavy with fruit. Here began countless days of hunting and snaring, fishing and gathering, roaming together through the woods, unloading our thoughts while we filled our game bags. This was the doorway to both sustenance and sanity. And we were all each other's key. My hand very gently ran over the exact spot that Gale had tackled me after stealing his game.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see Gale watching me. We were both likely thinking of that same moment. The moment that we had realized that we didn't have to live alone. We could have each other. Who knew that in a little over a decade things would have been so different? What would we have thought if we could have seen where we would end up? Would the two of us have even been friends for all of the years that we were? My thoughts were overwhelming.

There was no District 12 to escape from now, no Peacekeepers to trick, no hungry mouths to feed. It was strange to be here without them. Nothing else to think about. The Capitol took away all of that, and I was on the verge of losing Gale as well. The glue of mutual need that bonded us so tightly together for all those years was melting away. Dark patches, not light, showed in the spaces between us. All because of Cato. Was he worth it? For just a brief moment, I wasn't sure.

How could it have been that today, in the face of Twelve's horrible demise, we were too angry to even speak to each other? How could I have been thinking about Cato right now? This didn't have anything to do with him. Although, I supposed that he had everything to do with it. Because Gale as good as lied to me about him. That was unacceptable, even if he was concerned about my well-being. His apology seemed genuine this morning, though.

And I threw it back in his face with an insult to make sure it stung. Two years ago I would have never thought of doing or saying something like that to Gale. And I would have never even dared to think about slapping Gale the way that I had. What was happening to us? Why were we always at odds now? It was all a muddle, but I somehow felt that if I went back to the root of our troubles, my actions would be at the heart of it. Did I really want to drive him away?

Of course I didn't. He was one of the most important people in my life. He always had been and always would be. I didn't want to lose him. Not now and not ever. My fingers encircled a blackberry and plucked it from its stem. At one point, this would have been the difference between life and death. Things were so different now. I rolled it gently between my thumb and forefinger. Suddenly, I turned to Gale and tossed it in his direction.

"And may the odds -" I said.

Without taking a moment to think about whether or not I might enjoy the answer that I would get from Gale, I threw it high so that he had plenty of time to decide whether to knock it aside or accept it. I knew which one I was hoping for, but I also knew which one was more likely. Gale's eyes trained on me, not the berry, but at the last moment, he opened his mouth and caught it. A small smile broke over my face.

He chewed, swallowed, and there was a long pause before he said "- be ever in your favor." But he did say it.

A little while later Cressida had us sit in the nook in the rocks, where it was impossible not to be touching, and coaxed us into talking about hunting. What drove us out into the woods, how we met, and our favorite moments. We thawed, began to laugh a little, as we related mishaps with bees and wild dogs and skunks. Katniss and I talked about the lost beehive from the bear. Gale talked about my stealing his game. We talked about why Katniss was afraid of spiders and I was afraid of snakes.

So many of the memories were fun. So many of them made the three of us laugh and smile, leaning on each other for support. It was something that I hadn't felt in a long time. Clearly Dean and Skye felt the same way. They were smiling at me, seeing Cato's happy wife for the first time in a long time. When the conversation finally turned to how it felt to translate our skill with weapons to the bombing in Eight, I stopped talking, unsure of what to say. Katniss's voice instantly died.

Gale just said, "Long overdue."

By the time that we reached the Town Square again, afternoon was now sinking into evening. We hadn't been here in hours. It looked just as dead as it did earlier. I took Cressida to the rubble of the bakery and asked her to film something. My stomach lurched painfully as I wondered if I would vomit. The last time that I had been here I had found the corpses of those of Peeta's family who remained. Right now the only emotion that I could muster was exhaustion.

"Cato, do you remember Peeta?" My voice broke slightly as I waited a moment to continue speaking. "From our first Games. He was my District partner. This is District 12 now. This is his home. Yours doesn't look much different. None of his family has been heard of since the bombing. Twelve is gone. Two is under a martial law. People are dying every day."

My voice lodged itself in my throat. This was the part that I had known that I would have to get around to. It was one thing for Cato to see what had happened to my home. If he was really as far gone as he looked to be in the last propo that he had been in, I had to say something to jar him back to reality. And I knew what it would take. The same thing that had taken me to wake up. The knowledge that something had happened to the people who meant the most to him.

"L - Leah... Leah was killed during your family's evacuation from Two," I said, my voice breaking painfully. I just had to keep going. "The rest of them are safe." There were a few sobs from Dean and Skye. "You're calling for a cease-fire?" I looked across the emptiness. "There's no one left to hear you."

And there wasn't anyone left to hear him. There was no one left to hear anyone. The only people who were left in District 12 were those who were back in District 13. They certainly weren't going to be calling for a cease-fire anytime soon. Not after what they had seen happen to their home. Eventually we all headed off away from the bakery and a little further into the Town Square. Very few things remained. Just death and destruction.

As we came to a stand before the lump of metal that was the gallows, Cressida asked if either of us had ever been tortured. In answer, Gale pulled off his shirt and turned his back to the camera. I stared at the lash marks, and again heard the whistling of the whip, seeing his bloody figure hanging unconscious by his wrists. At least when I was a kid, things seemed a little less serious for me. When Cressida asked me the same, I merely stared at her.

"Yes. But there's no proof," I said, thinking of where the skin had once been raised from the black bear. "They take away your scars after the Games. Something to mold you into what they want. A perfect doll. The only scars that are left are on the inside. Invisible. Hidden. Secret."

"What happened?" Cressida asked.

"I'm done," I announced suddenly. I didn't want to think about all of the pain that they had caused me. "I'll meet you at the Victor's Village. Something for... my mother."

What did I actually want? Nothing really. There wasn't anything that I needed from the house. I had gotten it the first time that we had come here, but I needed to get away from everything for a few minutes. I needed to get away from the pitying looks that everyone was giving me. I needed to get away from Gale and Katniss's stares, wondering if I was remembering the same things that they were. So I merely let my feet blindly lead me.

Most of the trip I merely wound in and out of the bodies that littered the street. I guess that I walked here, but the next thing that I was conscious of was sitting on the floor in front of the kitchen cabinets of our house in the Victor's Village. Meticulously lining ceramic jars and glass bottles into a box. Placing clean cotton bandages between them to prevent breaking. Wrapping bunches of dried flowers. Things to keep my hands busy and keep from panicking.

Those very same things that I used to do during my days after the first Games. Things to keep me from losing my mind and to keep me grounded. Suddenly, I remembered the rose on my dresser that I had seen during my first trip back here. Was it real? If so, was it still up there? I had to resist the temptation to check. If it was there, it would only frighten me all over again. The scent of roses seemed to be seeping through the air. I hurried up with my packing.

When the cabinets were finally empty, I rose to find that Gale had materialized in my kitchen. He was alone this time. I wasn't sure where Katniss was. Likely giving us a moment. It was disturbing how soundlessly he could appear. It was a gift that he had always had. He was leaning on the table, his fingers spread wide against the wood grain. It was the same table that he had laid on after he had nearly been killed by the whip. I awkwardly set the box between us.

"Remember? This is where I kissed you," Gale said.

So the heavy dose of morphling administered after the whipping wasn't enough to erase that from his consciousness. Gale still wasn't looking at me. "I didn't think you'd remember that," I said dumbly.

"Have to be dead to forget. Maybe even not then. Maybe I'll be like that man in 'The Hanging Tree.' Still waiting for an answer," Gale said slowly.

Wracking guilt spread through me. "Gale," I started softly, "I -"

"I know, Aspen," Gale interrupted, already knowing where I was going with this. "You didn't pull away that day."

"I couldn't. Not seeing you the way that you were."

"That's all, huh?"

Obviously it was the wrong answer and I still didn't know what to say. "You just -"

"Looked weak. Hurt. Pathetic," Gale interrupted.

There was venom behind the pain in his voice. "That's not what I meant," I said quickly.

"I know."

Instantly I knew that there was no good answer to this problem. Everything that I said or did would hurt him. Gale, who I had never seen cry, had tears in his eyes. Pain spread through my chest as well. To keep those tears from spilling over, I reached forward and pressed my lips against his. We tasted of heat, ashes, and misery. It was a surprising flavor for such a gentle kiss. There was nothing in the kiss. Just desperation to spare his feelings. Gale pulled away first and gave me a wry smile.

"I knew you'd kiss me."

"How?" I asked. Because I didn't know myself.

"Because I'm in pain. That's the only way I get your attention." He picked up the box. "Don't worry, Aspen. It'll pass," Gale said carelessly.

It was a complete one-eighty from the way that he had been just a brief moment ago. Maybe because he could see the look in my eyes. Maybe because he saw that I didn't want to do what I had. It was just... instinct. Gale left before I could formulate an answer. Not that I knew one. Telling him that I didn't mean to kiss him would have been the wrong thing to say. Just like a moment ago, there was nothing that I could say or do to make things better here.

That was why he had left. To spare either one of us the pain of having to say the wrong things to each other and start another fight. As I wandered around the house, I knew only one thing. I knew that I shouldn't have kissed him. It echoed through my head over and over again as I walked up and down the stairs. Cato was back in the Capitol, going through absolute hell, and here I was, kissing someone else just to try and spare his feelings.

What kind of horrible person was I? Kissing someone else while I was already married? That was just the beginning of the very wrong thing that I had just done. Despite everything that had happened over the past few weeks, I really felt like I was married to Cato. And that meant that I shouldn't have done that. But if there was one thing that I couldn't stand, it was seeing those that I loved in pain. And I couldn't just turn off the love - whatever kind of love it was - that I had for Gale.

There was also the simple problem that I had likely set things between Gale and I back a number of steps. We had been making a fair amount of progress with each other before Cato's second propo had aired. Any progress that we had made over the last few weeks had been taken back in that one moment. The kiss - that one, stupid, kiss that had been more on an impulse than anything else - would certainly be something that we wouldn't be able to forget for a long time.

Maybe not even when Cato came back. I couldn't figure out if it was something that I should or shouldn't tell him. I could only assume that I really shouldn't. He would have enough to worry about. He didn't need to add an unfaithful wife on top of it all. I knew that I should have said something to Katniss, but when she came to take me back to the hovercraft, I didn't mention the kiss. Mostly because I felt so guilty about it. Kissing Gale when Cato was going through god-knows-what.

Not to mention that Gale was again acting like things could go back to normal with us. He was no longer acting like he hated me, more like he was sick of me. I was too weary to work through his latest charge. So I spent the short ride back to Thirteen curled up in a seat, trying to ignore Plutarch going on about one of his favorite subjects - weapons mankind no longer had at its disposal. High-flying planes, military satellites, cell disintegrators, drones, and biological weapons with expiration dates.

Brought down by the destruction of the atmosphere or lack of resources or moral squeamishness. All things that were no longer around and would likely never return. You could practically hear the regret of a Head Gamemaker who could only dream of such toys, who must make do with hovercraft and land-to-land missiles and plain old guns. It just reminded me of the kind of person that Plutarch was. Maybe even worse than Seneca had once been.

The entire thing made me furious - not that there was a shortage of any of those moments. I would always be angry about this. As Plutarch continued to talk, the hovercraft landed back in Thirteen and I brushed past him. I didn't even bother to speak to anyone. I was just glad that no one stopped me as I left. Not Katniss or Gale, both of whom looked like they might have moved towards me. I was glad that Gale didn't. Not even Dean or Skye tried to stop me. They knew what today was like for me.

After dropping off my Mockingjay suit, I went straight to bed without eating. Still no one came to check on me as the hours ticked by and I drifted blankly off to sleep. Even so, Prim had to shake me to get me up in the morning. Despite the sixteen hour sleep, I was still groggy. After breakfast, where I hid from everyone, I ignored my schedule and took a nap in the supply closet. When I came to, crawling out from between the boxes of chalk and pencils, it was dinnertime again.

It was a long time that I had slept as much as I did today without being in a semi-medically-induced coma. It was relieving. At dinner I once more ignored everyone. Not once did I even look in Gale's direction. I couldn't face him after what had happened. He didn't force a conversation and neither did anyone else. Other than the obligatory greeting, Cato's family didn't even speak to me. Although I did get an extra-large portion of pea soup.

About halfway through the meal, out of the corner of my eyes, I spotted Seneca walking over towards our table. He rarely ate with the rest of us. I assumed that he didn't like the looks that he got. I could understand that. He looked well-groomed for someone in Thirteen, as always. On my other side, I noticed that Gale instantly got up and left. He never did like dealing with Seneca. Katniss looked like she might fall asleep in her soup.

"Aspen," Seneca greeted. I nodded blankly. "You look -"

"Tired?" I offered.

"I was going to say exhausted," Seneca said.

"Well that's rude but not entirely inaccurate."

Seneca's face flushed slightly. "Pardon me."

"It's alright. What's up?" I asked, spinning around in my seat.

"There's something that I would like for you to see."

"That never sounds good."

"Come with me," Seneca said, giving a slight smile.

"Okay."

For a moment I turned back to Katniss to tell her that I would be back, but she was asleep on the table. Prim promised to let her know that I was only speaking with Seneca. The two of us left the dining hall together and headed over towards Seneca's room. We earned some strange looks as we walked. I knew that some people thought that something was happening between us - just as some people thought that I was with Gale. They would always think that there was someone other than Cato.

Sometimes even I was under that impression. As we walked into Seneca's room I asked, "What is it that you want me to see?" to try and get my mind off of the kiss with Gale yesterday.

"Sit for a moment," Seneca said.

"Why?" I asked blandly.

Even though I had slept almost completely through the last forty-eight hours, I wanted to go back to sleep. "Just sit down for a moment," Seneca said. I nodded slowly, perching myself at the edge of his bed. A moment later, Seneca leaned down to look at my injured shin. "It's getting better."

"My mother's been looking after me since we got back from Eight," I answered, watching as Seneca stood back upright. "Did you bring me all the way back here to talk about my leg?"

"We came here to talk," Seneca said.

"So talk," I snapped.

It wasn't that I was angry. I knew that he knew and I knew that he wanted to speak with me about it. Seneca cleared his throat somewhat awkwardly. "I knew that you saw Cato's interview," Seneca said.

"So you saw it?" I asked for confirmation.

Seneca nodded slowly. "We all saw it." I knew that they had all seen it. "They were concerned that you saw it. They bought the lie that you fed to them at dinner," Seneca said. At least they believed that I didn't know about Cato's current state. "But I saw it. You're a very gifted liar, Aspen. But I'm very good at spotting them."

Yes, he always had been good at spotting lies. Almost as good as I was at telling them. "He just looked so horrible. The way that he was speaking and acting. It was like it wasn't even Cato," I whispered.

"They aren't taking any shortcuts when it comes to Cato. They're putting out those interviews to try and push you. Hoping that you'll make the fools move."

"Go to the Capitol to get him back."

"Exactly. And we can't do that." Seneca grasped my hand upon seeing my panicked look. "Not yet, Aspen. We will. Just not yet," he corrected himself.

"When?"

"Eventually. We're not going to leave him there. I won't let them do that," Seneca said.

"Thank you," I said softly. "Do you think he'll be alright?"

If I was lucky, Cato would be a little traumatized but otherwise just fine. "I think that he's going to suffer when he comes back," Seneca answered honestly. I appreciated it, but I still twitched at the thought. "He's going to have to readjust to being out of the Capitol. He's going to have to realize that he's safe again. He likely won't trust anyone. Perhaps with yourself being the exception."

"It doesn't matter to me. I'll do anything that I can to help him. It's my fault that he wound up there in the first place," I said.

Anything that it took to help Cato, I was willing to do it. "That's not the truth. You know that," Seneca said. I shook my head. "What happened to him... honestly, it was our fault. We went after you, despite what you wanted."

That was why I hated Cato so much. Because he must have been happy at the way that things worked out. "But you did just what he wanted," I growled.

"Yes."

"And you don't regret it."

"No," Seneca said honestly. "The only thing that I regret is the way that it affected you."

"You didn't even think about that," I snapped.

"I couldn't. I'm still a Head Gamemaker."

"Big picture. Not the little details."

Seneca nodded again, looking not regretful, but maybe a little bit guilty. "Yes. I'm very sorry about what's happened with Cato, but we'll fix the mistake. We'll get him back," Seneca promised.

"When?" I repeated.

"If they're treating him the way that it seems, it'll be soon."

"Because they want it to be soon?"

"Because you do."

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

The two of us sat in silence for a long while before I managed to speak again. "What did you honestly bring me here for?" I asked.

Seneca turned to me in surprise. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"You didn't just bring me to talk about Cato," I said. Seneca tilted his head to the side in confusion. "You said that to try and open me up. Whether or not you think so, I do know you pretty well." Seneca smiled softly. "So what did you want to show me?"

"Just how much you inspire people," Seneca said with a small smile.

"What does that mean?" I asked curiously.

"Watch," Seneca said.

Watching curiously, I crossed my legs as Seneca walked over to the television that was mounted on his wall. He was one of the few people that I had seen with a television in their room. The television whirred to life up against the wall and the screen faded from black to white before the picture finally formed. It started playing exactly what had happened since the last time that Seneca had showed me how the actual war was going. I leaned forward and watched curiously.

It took me a moment to realize that we were watching security footage from somewhere. My eyebrow tilted upwards curiously. Off to the side was something else. It was the footage that Cressida had taken during our trip to Twelve yesterday. But there were no words on this propo. Instead, it was myself singing The Hanging Tree. I was simply walking back and forth, blankly taking in the ruin of my home, the others walking alongside me, The Hanging Tree echoing in the background.

Slowly I turned back towards the security footage as the volume was muted on the propo. Now I could hear what was being played on the security footage. Like the propo, The Hanging Tree was playing. But this time it wasn't me singing. It was the hundreds of people who were marching on what appeared to be the hydroelectric dam that separated District 5 from the rest of Panem and powered everything, including the Capitol.

My heart was firmly lodged in my throat as I watched. What were they doing? A suicide run, it looked like. It looked like they were coming from District 5, presumably their normal workers. Some of the groups of people were carrying crates. Crates that I could assume carried something incredibly dangerous for the Peacekeepers that worked in and around the dam. A few minutes passed that the group of District 5 citizens were marching on the dam before the scene changed.

It was now the security footage from the dam. I could see the Peacekeepers running out of the dam to defend it. They had clearly heard the singing. From the Peacekeepers point of view, I could tell that they were unable to see past the water of the dam. They had no idea where the attack was coming from. For a while all I could hear was the roaring of the water. But then it came. The loud humming and whistling of 'The Hanging Tree' coming from beyond the water.

The Peacekeepers raised their weapons to fire. Then it started. The screaming. The group of rebels began screaming as they passed the mist coming off of the dam. To the Peacekeepers' credit, they reacted before everyone else could. They began firing their rifles and all of the people in the front of the crowd began dropping. I cringed slightly and looked away for just a moment, desperate to see anything but their deaths... that I had caused.

A few seconds later I looked back at the screen. The people who were carrying the crates were ducked down behind the suicide runners, but as they dropped, so did the crate-carriers. Some who had been shot got back up. Others who hadn't been shot yet grabbed the ends. There were three in all, each one being brought up one of the different walkways. Peacekeepers on both the ground and up at the top of the dam were firing down on the group of rebels.

More and more rebels were falling, but as they continued to fall, they were also getting closer. Within seconds the rebels were closing in on the Peacekeepers who were still firing. And finally they managed it. Rebels sprinted up to the Peacekeepers and barreled into them. They all dropped down as the rebels both died and fought to wrestle the guns away from them. Meanwhile those carrying the crates were able to run inside of the dam with their packages.

The screens changed again to the insides of the dam. The two men each who were carrying the crates ran into their spots of the dam and dropped them, nearing the large water pipelines. One of the men for each of the crates were holding some type of explosive device. It was tiny, but I knew what it was. They slammed it down on the tops of the crates before sprinting out back towards the runways that led back to the woods with all of the other survivors.

There weren't many that had managed to survive the attacks that I could see. The screen once more changed to the cameras observing the dam. Just as the rebels managed to clear the dam, the explosives started going off. It didn't take long for cracks to form up the side of the dam to the point where it could no longer contain the explosions. It began cracking to the point where it started breaking open and water began rushing out.

The lights were cracking and collapsing with the rest of the dam. It didn't take long for the dam to begin cracking off in huge chunks and falling into the rushing water below. Eventually all of the lights were dimmed all around the dam and it appeared that the lights were turning off of the rest of the grid. Within moments, even the camera had darkened. They had actually managed to destroy the power grid to not only the Districts, but also the Capitol. That dam was their power source.

"Wow..." I whispered, realizing what a success that attack had been.

"Don't you see what you do to people?" Seneca asked softly.

"It's not just me. They believe in this cause," I said, swallowing harshly.

It was what I had to remember. The people weren't always doing this for me. It was for themselves. "But no one would believe in it this much. Not without someone around to help things along. You're the person that they all have faith in. You're the person that I have faith in," Seneca said.

"Maybe too much," I mumbled.

"Maybe. But I won't regret my choice either way."

"Thanks." We sat in silence for a moment before I glanced over at Seneca. "I'm glad you showed me that," I said.

"You need to see things like that. They don't want you to see quite how bad or intense things are, but I know that seeing things like that are what it takes to get you to move into action," Seneca explained.

"I suppose you know me better than either one of us would like to admit," I said.

"Believe it or not, I do," Seneca said.

Yes. He was right. He did know me. He knew me more than most of the other people in the Panem. With the exception of Cato, of course. "Can you help get Cato back?" I asked suddenly.

"I'm working on it, Aspen. I promise," Seneca said.

He reached over and grabbed my hands. "He's just been gone for too long."

"We're going to get him back. If it's the last thing that I do, I will not let him stay there."

"I'll trust you."

"Do you honestly have a choice?" Seneca asked.

It was just enough to amuse me. I didn't smile but I did let out a little breath. "Hah," I snapped irritably. "You're not funny."

To my surprise, Seneca actually smiled back. He hesitated a few moments before glancing back towards his door. "You know, they'll probably be looking for you," Seneca said.

"For what?" I asked curiously.

"There's a meeting soon."

"Damn. I don't want to be there."

One of the things that I really hated about Thirteen was the constant meetings. So many meetings where we all said the same things. "As one of the leaders of the rebellion, I would recommend you head straight to Command for the meeting," Seneca said. I raised a brow, sensing that he wasn't done. "As your friend, I would advise you to head back to your Compartment as quickly as possible and lock the door. Boggs will have quite a difficult time getting it open without you."

"Good advice. I think I'll take you up on it," I said.

"Will I be seeing you at the meeting?" Seneca asked.

"If I can't avoid Boggs," I explained.

We both laughed - a sound that seemed almost foreign out of my mouth - as I leaned forward and gave Seneca a long hug. He was comforting, something much different than he had once been. The two of us stayed together for a long white before I finally pulled away. Seneca pressed a kiss against my cheek as I pulled away - something that he had never done before. I smiled slightly at him. Every day we were starting to trust each other more and more.

After a moment I got to my feet and left Seneca's room. There were a few people who gave me funny looks, but I merely ignored them and headed off. I was planning on going back to my compartment to sleep even more, despite how much I had been getting lately. But lately I hadn't been sleeping well and I finally had a day that I was able to sleep freely. I just had to keep hiding. I was halfway back to Compartment E when Boggs intercepted me.

"There's a meeting in Command. Disregard your current schedule," Boggs said, referring to the meeting that Seneca had told me about.

"Done," I said.

Clearly there was no way of getting out of it. "Did you follow it at all today?" Boggs asked in exasperation.

"Who knows? I'm mentally disoriented." I held up my wrist to show my medical bracelet and realized that it was gone. "See? I can't even remember they took my bracelet," I said dumbly. When had they taken it? I wasn't sure. "Why do they want me in Command? Did I miss something?"

"I think Cressida wanted to show you the Twelve propos. But I guess you'll see them when they air," Boggs said.

"That's what I need a schedule of. When the propos air," I said.

Boggs shot me a look but didn't comment further. He clearly didn't really understand what I was talking about. Or maybe he was trying to contemplate it. People had crowded into Command, but they had saved me a seat between Finnick and Plutarch. It was easier than having to press myself into a seat next to Gale and pretend that things were okay. The screens were already up on the table, showing the regular Capitol feed. Evidently they had gotten their power back.

Or maybe it was the defense system that Beetee had designed that he still couldn't get past. "What's going on? Aren't we seeing the Twelve propos?" I asked.

"Oh, no. I mean, possibly. I don't know exactly what footage Beetee plans to use," Plutarch said.

"Beetee thinks he's found a way to break into the feed nationwide. So that our propos will air in the Capitol, too. He's down working on it in Special Defense now. There's live programming tonight. Snow's making an appearance or something. I think it's starting," Finnick said.

So they had managed to get their power back. "That's good, I suppose," I mumbled.

The Capitol seal appeared, underscored by the anthem. Then I was staring directly into President Snow's snake eyes as he greeted the nation like nothing was wrong. He seemed barricaded behind his podium, but the white rose in his lapel was in full view. I could see that he was sitting behind bulletproof glass. Of course, he knew that his life was in danger. The camera pulled back to include Cato, off to one side in front of a projected map of Panem.

My stomach lurched into my chest as I stared at him. Cato was sitting in an elevated chair, his shoes supported by a metal rung. He looked terrible. His leg was tapping out a strange irregular beat. He was clawing at the synthetic skin on his arm, looking almost like he was trying to rip it out. Beads of sweat had broken through the layer of powder on his upper lip and forehead. But it was the look in his eyes - angry yet unfocused - that frightened me the most.

"He's worse," I whispered.

It had only been a day... two days? Maybe three. Either way, it hadn't been that long. How did he look so much worse than he had just a little while ago? He looked horrible. Like he had been beaten every day since he had first gotten to the Capitol. Finnick grasped my hand, to give me an anchor, and I tried to hang on. On the far side of the room, I could hear Dean suck in a deep breath. He had Skye's face pressed into his shoulder. Julie was biting her lip, evidently fighting back tears.

Cato began to speak in a frustrated tone about the need for the cease-fire. He was jerkily highlighting the damage done to key infrastructure in various Districts, and as he spoke, parts of the map lit up, showing images of the destruction. A broken dam in Five. The one that Seneca just showed me. A derailed train with a pool of toxic waste spilling from the tank cars. A granary collapsing after a fire. All of these he attributed to rebel action - all of which was likely true.

"Tonight, we've received reports of derailed trains, of granaries on fire, and of a savage attack on the hydroelectric dam in District 5," Cato's voice echoed, sounding terrible.

"Oh, what have they done to you?" I whispered desperately.

I was so glad that at least Alana wasn't around. Damien was, but he was watching with a stony gaze. "I'm begging for restraint and decency," Cato said.

"We interrupt your regularly scheduled horse manure to bring you..." Beetee muttered from the side.

Of course. I had almost forgotten that he was supposed to be interrupting the Capitol's broadcast to show all of the propos that Cressida and the others had filmed while we were in Twelve. I wanted to beg Beetee not to change the screen for a moment. I needed to be able to keep my eye on Cato. I needed to see what they were doing to him. But Beetee interrupted the video with my propo video - finally able to break through his own Capitol airway defense system.

There was the very sudden crack on the screen. Without warning, I was suddenly on television, standing in the rubble of the bakery. Perfect timing. Plutarch jumped to his feet. "He did it! Beetee broke in!"

"That's it. That's our footage," Coin whispered.

"Aspen?" Cato asked.

On the far corner of the screen, I could see that Cato was still being broadcast. He was seeing me as we'd broken through. "He sees it. He sees our propo," Coin said.

"Aspen, are you there?" Cato asked.

It was the first time that I had seen some real emotion in his eyes. It looked like he had been snapped out of some type of trance. I could feel both Finnick and Seneca trying to grab onto my legs to keep me seated, but I batted them away. So I got up and very slowly walked towards the screen, tears threatening to spill over my eyes. Dean, Skye, Julie, and Damien were all on their feet. They all looked ready to pull me away from the screen at any given moment.

"Cato..." I whispered, my voice cracking.

"Aspen?" Cato repeated.

"Cato, please continue," Caesar Flickerman - whom I hadn't noticed was also on screen for the interview - prompted. "You were telling us about these savage attacks."

"Yeah," Cato said blankly, going back to his trance-like state and peering into the camera. "The attack on the dam was a callous and inhuman act of destruction..."

The room was still buzzing with reaction when Cato was officially back, distracted. Our propo was no longer playing. He clearly was unable to go back to the way that he was before seeing me on the monitor. He tried to pick up his speech by moving on to the bombing of a water purification plant, when a clip of Finnick talking about Rue replaced him. The struggle in Cato's eyes was clear. After all, he had been the one to comfort me after her death.

Then the whole thing broke down into a broadcast battle, as the Capitol tech masters tried to fend off Beetee's attack. But they were unprepared, and Beetee, apparently anticipating that he would not hold on to control, had an arsenal of five to ten second clips to work with. Plus this was his design in the first place. He already knew how to fight with it. We watched the official presentation deteriorate as it was peppered with choice shots from the propos.

Plutarch was in spasms of delight and most everybody was cheering Beetee on, but Finnick remained still and speechless beside me. I knew that he was thinking about Annie - whether or not she was in the same state that Cato was. I doubted it. She had known nothing. She was merely serving as bait for him. I met Haymitch's eyes from across the room and saw my own dread mirrored back. Even Brutus looked horrified. The recognition that with every cheer, Cato slipped even farther from our grasp.

The Capitol seal was finally back up, accompanied by a flat audio tone. That lasted about twenty seconds before Snow, Caesar and Cato returned. The set was in turmoil. It was nothing like the calm and collected Capitol that we had all seen so many times before. We were hearing frantic exchanges from their booth. They couldn't realize how to turn everything off. They didn't know how to fight our attacks off. They hadn't been expecting this.

Snow plowed forward, saying that clearly the rebels were now attempting to disrupt the dissemination of information they found incriminating, but both truth and justice would reign. If I wasn't so horrified, I would have enjoyed seeing how far I could get my eyes to roll back into my head. The full broadcast would apparently resume when security had been reinstated. He asked Cato if, given tonight's demonstration, he had any parting thoughts for Aspen Antaeus.

At the mention of my name, Cato's face contorted in effort. "Aspen... think about it. How do you think this will end? What will be left? No one can survive this. No one is safe now. Not here in the Capitol. Not in any of the Districts." There was a little twitch that went through him, and suddenly he looked extremely unstable. "They're coming, Aspen. They're gonna kill everyone. And you... in Thirteen..." He inhaled sharply, as if fighting for air; his eyes looked insane. "Dead by morning!"

Off camera, Snow ordered, "End it!"

What the hell had just happened? My first tear fell out of my eyes and ran down my face. They didn't stop after that. What the hell was happening? What did he mean that we were going to be dead by morning? I tried to run after the camera, but there was no way for me to stop what was happening. Beetee threw the whole thing into chaos by flashing a still shot of me standing in front of the hospital at three-second intervals.

Brutus had me around the waist. I could feel him shaking - the first sign of weakness that I had ever seen from him. He was keeping me from moving. Between the images, we were privy to the real-life action being played out on the set. Cato's attempt to continue speaking. The camera knocked down to record the white tiled floor. The scuffle of boots. The impact of the blow that's inseparable from Cato's cry of pain. And his blood as it splattered the tiles.

Chapter 11: Chapter Eleven

The scream began in my lower back and worked its way up through my body only to jam in my throat. Every inch of me wanted to let out the same piercing scream that Julie and Skye did. Dean had them around the waists, trying to drag them from the room, trying to get them away from the screens, but I wasn't watching them any longer. Instead I was still staring at the screen, trying to force the scream out. But I was Avox mute, choking on my grief.

Even if I could release the muscles in my neck, let the sound tear into space, would anyone have noticed it? Probably not. The room was in an uproar. The screams from the few people who were panicked from Cato's predicament were now joining the rest of the fray. Questions and demands rang out as they tried to decipher Cato's words. 'And you... in Thirteen... dead by morning!" Yet no one was asking about the messenger whose blood had been replaced by static.

There were a large number of people standing in front of me. Instantly I broke through the crowd to try and get to the screen. I wasn't sure what that was going to do, but I needed to be there. I needed to be... closer to him? Who knew? But I wanted to be as close to him as I could possibly be. There were a few hands grasping at me, trying to keep me away from the computer screens, but I merely threw a shoulder back into their head. I had a feeling that it was Brutus that I had just elbowed.

It was all in my desperation to get to the computers. To get to one of the screens. To see him. I arrived at one of the panels a few moments after elbowing Brutus, but I couldn't figure out how to work it. I couldn't get the screens to show me what was happening with Cato. Snow had clearly disabled the cameras in the Capitol the moment that Cato had issued his warning. There was no way that we were going to be able to get back his previous broadcast.

Barely five seconds passed that I was pressing buttons and turning dials on the monitor panels before there were hands on my shoulder. Just the way that Brutus had grabbed me before. But I still didn't move. Instead I found the button to play back the video of Cato's most recent interview over and over again. I could see the utter shock in his eyes right before the broadcast ended, right after he issued his warning. That crazed look in his eyes when he talked about Thirteen.

What the hell had they been doing to him? What was he talking about? Clearly I wasn't the only one who was wondering. Dean, Skye, Julie, and Damien were all trying to pull me away from the screen to save me from having to look at what was happening to Cato. I knew that there were more pressing matters at hand, like saving ourselves from what seemed to be an impending doom, but I couldn't. Cato was trying to warn us. But he was the one who seemed to be in the most danger.

A voice called the others to attention. "Shut up!" Every pair of eyes fell on Haymitch. "It's not some big mystery! The boy's telling us we're about to be attacked. Here. In Thirteen."

"How would he have that information?"

"Why should we trust him?"

"How do you know?"

It was the same way that they had all sounded when Cato had first called for a cease-fire. Haymitch gave a growl of frustration. "They're beating him bloody while we speak. What more do you need? Aspen, help me out here!"

"Yes, it was," Boggs said softly.

As angry as I was with Haymitch, as much as I didn't want to talk to him, I knew that we had to speak to each other right now. We were on the same side. Trying to save Cato. And I knew that it was the most important thing right now - to put aside any hatred that I had for Haymitch and ensure that my husband would be okay. All of that after I made sure that we were all going to be okay. I still had to give myself a shake to free my words.

"Haymitch's right. I don't know where Cato got the information. Or if it's true," I said slowly, having to admit the truth. "But he believes it is. And they're -"

My voice broke off painfully. The words lodged in my throat and instead a strangled noise came out. The same one that I had heard so many times before. The same one that I got every time that I spoke about what was happening with Cato. Even after being used to his deplorable condition in the Capitol, I still couldn't say aloud what Snow was doing to him. Dean's hand went to my back, gently steering me away from the computer that was replaying Cato's warning.

"How can we believe him?" Coin asked.

My head snapped to her. How couldn't they believe him? He had risked his own life to warn us. "Because no matter what's happening to him, his first thought is to always keep Aspen safe," Brutus said loudly, a snarling undertone to his words. "If he's saying something about an attack in Thirteen, it's because he believes it and is trying to ensure that she's safe."

"They're right," Dean said suddenly. "Cato's trying to save us."

"He's trying to save Aspen," Skye explained, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"You don't know him. We do. Get your people ready," Haymitch said to Coin.

He was right about that. As much as I wanted to kill Haymitch, he did know Cato. We did. Coin briefly looked to Brutus, who nodded his agreement. Coin nodded slowly and turned her back on us. The president didn't seem alarmed, only somewhat perplexed, by the whole turn in events. She mulled over the words, tapping one finger lightly on the rim of the control board in front of her. It plunged the room into a tense silence. When she spoke, she addressed Haymitch in an even voice.

"Of course, we have prepared for such a scenario. Although we have decades of support for the assumption that further direct attacks on Thirteen would be counterproductive to the Capitol's cause. Nuclear missiles would release radiation into the atmosphere, with incalculable environmental results. Even routine bombing could badly damage our military compound, which we know they hope to regain. And, of course, they invite a counter strike. It is conceivable that, given our current alliance with the rebels, those would be viewed as acceptable risks."

Her voice was so bland that someone would think that she was talking about afternoon tea. I had been in more interesting and thrilling conversations over bread with Katniss and Gale back in Thirteen before it had been destroyed. Her voice was so cold and calculating. Perhaps that was some of the reason that I really didn't trust her. Perhaps it was because she never seemed happy or nervous or angry. She always just seemed... complacent.

"You think so?" Haymitch asked.

His voice broke me out of my thoughts. I glanced over at him and narrowed my eyes. Coin had to have seen through it. She seemed to have a talent for reading people. It was mostly because Haymitch had been a shade too sincere, but the subtleties of irony were often wasted in Thirteen.

"I do. At any rate, we're overdue for a Level Five security drill. Let's proceed with the lock-down," Coin said.

Why weren't they talking about Cato though? "We have to get him out before they kill him," I said desperately, starting towards Coin.

"Don't worry, they're going to get him out," Katniss said, drawing me back to her. "They're not leaving him there."

"We have to get to him," I repeated.

We needed to get ourselves to safety, but we also had to save him. He could have already been dead. "We're going to, but we can't do that if we're dead. He gave us a warning. He gave you a warning," Damien said, wrapping an arm over my shoulder and pulling me along. "We have to take it. We'll get him afterwards."

"Come on, Aspen," Seneca said, grabbing me from Damien. "We have to get below."

"What are they doing to him?" I asked Seneca, knowing that if anyone would know what they were doing to Cato, it would be him.

"They're not going to kill him. They'll be more concerned with killing us right now. We need to go. Come on," Seneca said.

As we headed out of the room, I saw Coin standing over one of the monitors. "Is there anything in the air?" she asked, looking down over a man's shoulder.

"Nothing on Doppler, ma'am," the man responded.

"He was in the mansion, he could have overheard something," Coin said to Plutarch.

"Possibly," Plutarch muttered.

Coin mulled that over for a few seconds. "It's time for an air raid drill," she finally confirmed.

The Capitol seal was lighting up the room but it was quickly replaced with the strobe lights that echoed during an emergency air raid drill. The alarm was blaring through the entirety of Thirteen to warn everyone who hadn't just seen the warning. I quickly turned on my heels with Katniss behind me as the two of us darted out into one of the offshoots of the war room. Everyone was heading downstairs into the bunker as Katniss and I fell in line with them, moving down the spiraling staircase quickly.

"This is a code red alert. Please, remain calm and begin evacuation protocol," the air raid drill siren repeated.

Having not been able to make it too far from the war room yet, I could see Coin nodding at everyone else to leave. It would be mere minutes before all of Thirteen was downstairs in the bunker. I couldn't imagine it would have enough room for all of us, but apparently it would. There had been two low-level drills since I arrived in Thirteen. Neither one was serious and they were just drills. This was the real thing. It was the first that apparently almost everyone was experiencing.

The Capitol had had no reason to attack them until I arrived. I didn't remember much about the first drill. I was still in intensive care in the hospital. I was pretty sure that I hadn't even awoken from the concussion yet. I was pretty sure that the patients were exempted, as the complications of removing us for a practice drill outweighed the benefits. I was vaguely aware of a mechanical voice instructing people to congregate in yellow zones. That was about all that I could remember.

During the second air raid drill, a Level Two drill meant for minor crises - such as a temporary quarantine while citizens were tested for contagion during a flu outbreak - we were supposed to return to our living quarters. That was much less serious and the very reason that I hadn't seen the bunker that we were supposed to be heading into yet. During that drill, I'd stayed behind a pipe in the laundry room, ignored the pulsating beeps coming over the audio system, and watched a spider construct a web.

No one had even noticed that I wasn't around. Neither experience had prepared me for the wordless, eardrum-piercing, fear-inducing sirens that now permeated Thirteen. It was so loud that it would have been deafening, had I not already known what that felt like. There would be no disregarding this sound, which seemed designed to throw the whole population into a frenzy. I wouldn't have been surprised. But this was Thirteen and that didn't happen.

It was like they did one of these drills every day. I hesitated for a moment, unsure of where I was supposed to go, but it didn't matter. The others knew. Boggs guided Finnick, Katniss, and me out of Command, along the hall to a doorway, and onto a wide stairway. It didn't take me long to become completely overwhelmed. Where was everyone? Where were Cato's family? Where was mine? Streams of people were converging to form a river that flowed only downward. They looked almost like robots.

They weren't even the slightest bit panicked. No one shrieked or tried to push ahead. Even the children didn't resist as their parents led them along. We descended, flight after flight, speechless, because no word could be heard above the sound of the sirens. I looked for Ms. Everdeen and Prim, along with the Hadley's, but it was impossible to see anyone but those immediately around me. My family were both working in the hospital tonight, so there was no way they could miss the drill.

At least, I was pretty sure that was where they were. "Where's Prim?" I asked Katniss.

She looked as concerned as I felt. "She's in the hospital," Katniss called back.

"Finnick -" I started.

"They'll be down there," Finnick interrupted, already knowing what I was talking about. "Don't worry, Aspen. We have to keep moving."

"We'll go back and get her if we can't find her," Katniss whispered.

The two of us continued downwards, our feet pounding on the stairs as we continued downwards towards the bunker. My legs weren't the steadiest from what I had just seen with Cato, but I was still managing to remain slightly steady. It helped that I had Katniss for support. The two of us were right ahead of Boggs and Finnick. Seneca wasn't far ahead of us, trying to bring some of the Capitol refugees along with him. Of course they were some of the priorities. They knew their tricks, like this one.

"Are you okay?" I asked Katniss after we had descended a few stories.

"I'm fine," Katniss said, despite the fact that she was very obviously not fine. "Are you?"

"No," I said honestly.

Katniss laid her hand on my shoulder as we continued downwards. "It's going to be okay, Aspen. You're going to be okay. We all will be. We just have to keep moving," she muttered breathlessly.

"How far down is this?" I asked Boggs.

"Far enough to avoid a nuclear strike," he responded.

"Is that what it is?" I asked nervously.

"We'll find out afterwards," Boggs said.

He was a man that seldom showed any emotion. In fact, I was positive that I had never seen him show any emotion before. But there was something in his voice right now, maybe concern, which made me even more nervous than I was before. I knew Boggs' voice well enough to know that he meant that the only way we would know if the bombing was nuclear would be whether or not we were dead in the morning. We might have been able to survive a nuclear strike, but it would be harder than anything else.

My ears popped and my eyes felt even heavier the further down that we went and the more minutes that passed. We were coal-mine deep. I knew that Katniss and I were thinking the exact same thing. Would we die, suffocating on the poisonous air, the exact same way that her father had? I supposed that we would know in a matter of hours. The only plus of this entire thing was that the farther we retreated into the earth, the less shrill the sirens became.

It was as if they were meant to physically drive us away from the surface, which I supposed they were. Groups of people began to peel off into marked doorways and still Boggs directed us downward, until finally the stairs ended at the edge of an enormous cavern. I started to walk straight in and Boggs stopped me, showing me that I must wave my schedule in front of a scanner so that I was accounted for. No doubt the information was going to some computer somewhere to make sure no one had gone astray.

The place seemed unable to decide if it was natural or man-made. Certain areas of the walls were stone, while steel beams and concrete heavily reinforced others. Sleeping bunks were hewn right into the rock walls. It seemed that this had already been well-fortified by the earth, and Thirteen had simply made even better use of it. There was a kitchen, bathrooms, and a first-aid station. This place was designed for an extended stay. And this part seemed to be for the higher-up members.

White signs with letters or numbers were placed at intervals around the cavern. I assumed that they were where we were all supposed to be staying. As Boggs told Finnick, Katniss, and I to report to the area that matched our assigned quarters - in my case E for Compartment E - Plutarch strolled up. Finnick immediately walked off, looking very blank-faced. I assumed that in the wake of Cato's state, he was once more thinking about how Annie was doing.

"Ah, here you are," Plutarch said happily.

"You seem happy," I commented.

"What's to be upset about?" Plutarch asked confusedly.

"Would you like a list?"

My eyes narrowed to the point that I could hardly see anymore. It was proof that Plutarch was from the Capitol. No little issues of bumps. He was a big-picture kind of person. Recent events had had little effect on Plutarch's mood. He still had a happy glow from Beetee's success on the Airtime Assault. Eyes on the forest, not on the trees. Not on Cato's punishment or Thirteen's imminent blasting. It infuriated me.

Desperate to do something other than punching Plutarch, I merely rolled my eyes. That was all that I could do to not punch his lights out. I had meant one thing that I had said. Did he want a list of the many things that were bothering me right now? How long could that list even be? Probably an insanely long one. There were so many things that I was upset about these days that I wouldn't have even known where to start.

Even though I knew that it would be a better idea to stop thinking about everything that was upsetting me, I started thinking about those very things. I hated being in Thirteen. This entire place bothered me. It bugged me that I couldn't get a read on Coin. I didn't trust her, even though she was the person trying to help me. I hated what had happened to District 12. Gale was still stressing me out with his constant questioning of our status.

That wasn't even near everything. I was still reeling from Leah's death and Cinna's. Every moment from both trips to the Hunger Games still haunted me at all hours. Haymitch's lies were still constantly running around my head. He had lied to me about what he had once promised. The apparent secret that he was still hiding from me was scratching at the corners of my head. The stress of being the Mockingjay. More than anything, everything that had been happening with Cato.

"Aspen, obviously this is a bad moment for you, what with Cato's setback, but you need to be aware that others will be watching you," Plutarch said in a voice that he obviously thought was supposed to be comforting.

"What?" I asked.

One glance at Katniss told me that I wasn't just imagining what he had just told me. She was looking at him with a stare that told me that she was about to grab her bow from upstairs and shoot him herself. I was feeling much the same way. It never failed to amaze me at just how cruel the people from the Capitol could be. Despite that, I couldn't believe that he actually just downgraded Cato's dire circumstances to a setback.

"The other people in the bunker, they'll be taking their cue on how to react from you. If you're calm and brave, others will try to be as well. If you panic, it could spread like wildfire," Plutarch explained.

In my own way, I could understand what Plutarch was talking about. He knew that people tended to take cues from me. It was obvious enough, the way that my few actions had caused such a wave, but that didn't change the fact that it was completely insensitive. People were allowed to be panicked right now. I was allowed to be destroyed for this one moment. I had just seen my husband be beaten, potentially killed. So I just stared at him.

"Fire is catching, so to speak," Plutarch continued, as if I was being slow on the uptake.

"Why don't I just pretend I'm on camera, Plutarch?" I offered.

"Yes! Perfect. One is always much braver with an audience. Look at the courage Cato just displayed!" Plutarch hollered.

The courage that Cato just displayed... Was he kidding? Cato was trying to save my life - all of our lives - despite whatever it would cost him, which was clearly a lot. It might have even been his life. My voice lodged in my throat as about three hundred different insults came to mind. Katniss looked like she might have said something to him, but I grabbed her arm and pulled her back. There was no use fighting right now. It was also all that I could do not to slap him.

"I've got to get back to Coin before lock-down. You keep up the good work!" Plutarch said, and then headed off.

Katniss and I stared at each other for a good few seconds. She eventually merely scoffed and walked off, probably going to go somewhere that she could freely curse where no one would be listening. I also had a vague feeling that she might have been going back to looking for Prim and Ms. Everdeen. Right now I was so convinced that I was going to punch Plutarch's lights out. I was furious about the way that he and everyone else had been essentially ignoring Cato's condition.

"Watch it, Fire Girl," Brutus half-sung, walking up to where Katniss had been a few moments beforehand. "If you still want to save him, you're going to have to play with them. We stay here for now. When this is over, it'll be time to get him back."

There was something almost weak about the way that he was speaking. "Are you okay, Brutus?" I asked carefully.

He was looking at me like I'd lost my mind. "Are you kidding?"

"Cato told me how close the two of you were when he was growing up. I know that even when the two of you fought, you meant very much to him," I said, remembering the physical fight on the train between them after we won the first Games. They had seemed to go back to normal not long afterwards. "And I assume that it went both ways."

Brutus stared at me for a long few moments before placing a hand on my shoulder. "You're not half-bad, kid."

"Thanks."

Another brief silence passed. "Cato would be proud of you," Brutus said.

"He'd be proud of both of us."

Brutus's eyebrows popped up. "How's that?"

Chuckling humorlessly, I shook my head. "Here we are, having a civil conversation that hasn't been forced, and we haven't killed each other yet," I pointed out.

"He would think that he was imagining things," Brutus agreed.

The two of us might not ever be friendly, but when it came to Cato's well-being, we would always be able to put aside our arguments. "Think this'll be over soon?" I finally asked.

"I'm going to talk to Coin about everything. See how long it'll take for us to get back above ground," Brutus offered.

He headed off, but before he could get too far, I called him back. "Wait!" Brutus turned back curiously. "Cato's family... Are they all here?" I asked slowly.

Brutus glanced back and I held my breath. Prim and Ms. Everdeen were already missing. I couldn't handle the Hadley's being gone too. "That I can see, yeah," Brutus finally said. I let out a deep breath. "There's Damien and Alana. Carrie has Marley in her arms. Dean's helping pull everyone back down here to safety. Skye's helping Julie out over in first aid. Foot's bothering her."

But one was still missing. "Aidan?" I asked.

Brutus had clearly almost forgotten about him. His head whipped back and forth a few times before he glanced back at me. "I - I don't see him. Probably with his brother. Head over to your compartment," Brutus ordered.

"Okay," I muttered.

There was a sickened feeling seeping into my stomach. I needed to make sure that Cato's family was okay. While he wasn't here, it was my job to watch out for them. I had already failed Leah. I couldn't fail the rest of them. Right now I was fearing for Aidan much in the same way that I feared for Prim and Ms. Everdeen. In the back of my mind I was sure that they would all be here, perfectly fine, in the next few minutes, but it didn't stop me from getting nervous for them.

Trying to ignore those worries, I crossed to the big letter E that was posted on the wall. Our space consisted of a twelve-by-twelve-foot square of stone floor delineated by painted lines. Carved into the wall were two bunks - one of us would be sleeping on the floor - and a ground-level cube space for storage. There was a small cot that I assumed either Ms. Everdeen or Prim was meant to use. A piece of white paper, coated in clear plastic, read BUNKER PROTOCOL.

Maybe I should have been paying a little more attention to what we were supposed to do in the event of a bombing. I stared fixedly at the little black specks on the sheet. For a while, they were obscured by the residual blood droplets that I couldn't seem to wipe from my vision. Only a tiny bit of blood... But how much more had been spilled since then? Slowly, the words came into focus. The first section was entitled 'On Arrival.'

1. Make sure all members of your Compartment are accounted for.

There was one of the things that I was the most panicked about. Ms. Everdeen and Prim hadn't arrived, but I was one of the first people to reach the bunker. Both of them were probably helping to relocate hospital patients. That was what Katniss had said. She was still helping some of the children get settled. The Hadley's were all present, save one of them. Aidan was likely off helping Dean pull everyone else below ground and to their stations.

2. Go to the Supply Station and secure one pack for each member of your Compartment. Ready Your Living Area. Return pack(s).

The what? I scanned the cavern until I located the Supply Station, a deep room set off by a counter. People waited behind it, but there wasn't a lot of activity there yet. I walked over, gave our compartment letter, and requested four packs. A man checked a sheet, pulled the specified packs from shelving, and swung them up onto the counter. After sliding one on my back and getting a grip on the other three with my hands, I thanked him and turned to find a group rapidly forming behind me.

"Excuse me," I said as I carried my supplies through the others.

None of them said anything to me. Many of them looked incredibly terrified and very shaken, but they said nothing. They were trying to look brave. Parents for their children and children for their parents. Was the entire thing a matter of timing? Or was it possible that Plutarch was right? Were these people modeling their behavior on mine? It seemed that they were. Either way, it didn't excuse the way that Plutarch was acting right now.

Back at our space, I opened one of the packs to find a thin mattress, bedding, two sets of gray clothing, a toothbrush, a comb, and a flashlight. On examining the contents of the other packs, I found the only discernible difference was that they contained both gray and white outfits. The latter would be for Ms. Everdeen and Prim, in case they had medical duties. Katniss's pack was identical to mine. We would likely just have sit and wait out the attack.

Whether or not I would want to have something to do right now would be a different question. Hopefully I would be able to sleep through the attack, once it got here, that was. For a while I moved around and grabbed everything that I needed. Not that I had much with me. I hadn't thought to bring everything from our compartment... After I made up all of the beds, stored the clothes, and returned the backpacks, I had nothing to do but observe the last rule.

3. Await further instructions.

With nothing else to do, I sat cross-legged on the floor to await. A steady flow of people began to fill the room, claiming spaces and collecting supplies. It wouldn't take long until the place was filled up. Would everyone in District 13 even be able to fit down here? Was there a priority list? I wondered if Ms. Everdeen and Prim were going to stay the night at wherever the hospital patients had been taken. But, no, I didn't think so. They were on the list here.

A figure interrupted my panicked thoughts. "Aspen," Alana greeted, "how are you?"

"Waiting for my mother and Prim," I said honestly.

Alana nodded slowly, glancing up and looking around. "Katniss is here, isn't she?"

Nodding at her, I turned back and pointed to where I could see her dark hair whipping around. "She's helping the kids off on the other end of the bunker. I think that she's trying to keep her mind off of the fact that we don't know where the rest of our family is," I said.

"I'm sure that they're both alright. Just helping people."

"That's what we're hoping for." We sat in silence for a little while before I glanced up at my mother-in-law. "Alana?"

"Yes, dear?"

"Did you see Cato's most recent interview?" I asked cautiously.

A lump slid down her throat. "They told me about it. I didn't see it," she admitted weakly.

Maybe I shouldn't have said anything... Maybe I should have never met her son... I reached over and grabbed her hand. "I'm really sorry about everything. I'm sorry that he ended up there. I'm sorry that I didn't do enough to try and save him," I muttered weakly.

Alana gave me a broken smile. "Oh, Aspen, you need to stop thinking like that," she commented sharply. "You've done nothing to hurt him. In fact, you helped make him into the man that I always knew he could be. He's always been a good man. I knew that. But there was something about you that helped change him from a boy to a man. No matter what happens, I'll always be grateful that you entered his life and ours."

There was once a time that I had hated District 2. Everything that they did. The love that they had for the Hunger Games. The hatred and bias that they had for the other Districts. But it was times like this that I remembered that there were real people in District 2, just as there had been in Twelve. People like Alana, who loved her daughter-in-law, despite the fact that her son had gone to hell and back because of his wife's stupid actions.

"And as for the Games?" I asked carefully.

"You're asking this to a woman who has never genuinely enjoyed the Games. I've partook in them, like everyone else. But to end the Games once and for all, it's worth it," Alana answered.

"Even your son?"

Alana let out a soft breath. "Like I've said before, Aspen. My kids mean everything in the world to me. Those related to me in blood and through marriage. All the same to me. They're all my kids. I've gained a daughter because of this," Alana said, grasping my hands tightly. "And I haven't lost my son yet."

"No. You haven't lost your son and I haven't lost my husband," I agreed.

Alana's lips turned upwards. "I'm glad that you still think of him like that."

"Always," I said honestly. Even if he died, as much as it would break me, he would always be considered my husband. "Whether or not I've always made it known, he's everything that I ever wanted."

"You're everything that he needed... and more."

"Thank you, Alana."

"Any time, my dear."

She always had said the things that I needed to hear. Like telling me exactly what I had meant to Cato. What I still meant to him. He was the love of my life. I knew that we felt the same about each other. Alana and I sat in silence for a good while. We didn't need to say anything. There was nothing to say. These were the moments that we simply had to sit together and remember that we weren't alone. We never would be, no matter what happened.

Suddenly something dawned on me. "Can I ask you something?"

Alana turned to me and nodded. "Anything."

"Where is Aidan?"

Alana's head tilted to the side. "Aidan? My son?" she asked.

"Yes," I said. "I haven't -"

"He's not down here?" Alana interrupted, looking suddenly very panicked.

Instantly I wished that I hadn't said anything. She wasn't going to be able to calm down now. "Not that I've seen. But he's not the only one that I haven't been able to find. Prim and my mother aren't here yet either. They're probably still helping out in the hospital," I said as reassuringly as possible.

Alana slowly started shaking her head. "No. I spoke to Aidan just before the sirens went off." Alana hesitated for a moment. "I sent him... to the hospital," she mumbled.

"For what?" I asked.

"To make sure that the rest of the children were making it out safe."

"He'll be with Prim and my mother. He'll be fine."

The doubt was laced in both of our voices. A moment later, Dean leaned down in between the two of us. "What are we talking about?" he asked curiously.

"Aidan," Alana gasped, turning to her eldest son. "He's missing."

"What are you talking about?" Dean asked, furrowing his brows. "I was just with Aidan."

"When?" Alana asked.

"Just before we went down to the meeting. The two of us were talking about everything and then I left to get to the meeting on time," Dean explained.

"Where did he go?" Alana asked.

"I'm not sure. He said that he was going to go see what Prim was doing," Dean said.

That caught me by surprise. "Prim?" I asked.

At the same time that I asked, Carrie appeared on Dean's other side. "The two of them have gotten rather close lately. Feeling like they've both lost a sibling and now technically being relatives themselves," Carrie said. I twitched with guilt. She still felt like she had lost me... Aidan had lost Leah because of me. "He probably wanted to see if she was doing okay."

"Have you seen him since?" I asked.

Carrie shook her head. "No." I could hear Alana give a tiny whine. "He was on his way to the hospital the last time that I saw him."

"He'll be okay, Mom," Dean said, wrapping his arm over her shoulders. "You know Aidan. He's probably trying to make sure that everyone else is safe."

"Is the rest of the family okay?" I asked.

"They're all okay," Alana said.

"Marley?" I asked, realizing that the little girl was nowhere to be found.

Carrie gave a small smile and shook her head. "She's fine, I put her to bed a little while ago. I'm hoping that she'll sleep through the entire attack," Carrie said. I raised a brow, unsure of how she would possibly be able to sleep through a bombing. "Thirteen supplied the younger kids with earplugs. She's wearing those but I'd still rather her sleep through it all."

That was surprisingly thoughtful for people who didn't even seem to understand human emotion. "The doctors might bring some sleeping medication. You could always try that. Just the once, she should be okay. No nightmares or hallucinations," I said, sensing Carrie's concern for the medication. "I was just starting to get dependent on it."

"That's not a bad idea. You okay?" Carrie asked.

"I'll live," I answered honestly.

It looked like Carrie might have been ready to say something back to me, but a guard walked up between us. "Please return to your bunks to await further instructions," the man warned the Hadley's.

They all glanced at me. "Go on back. I'll see you all a little later," I said.

"It's going to be okay," Carrie said, grabbing my shoulder.

As she walked off, her husband kneeled down next to me. "We'll keep an eye out for Aidan and let you know when he gets here," he promised.

"Thank you," I said.

After a few seconds, Alana rose to her feet with me. "Try and get some sleep for a little while. No use dwelling on things that we can't change and it looks like we might be here for a little while," she pointed out.

"Yeah," I said numbly, "you guys get some sleep too."

"Take care," Alana said.

As we all moved back to our original spots, I shifted back a few steps and fall back onto the cot that was laid out. For a long while I just sat there and picked at my nails, which were already very chipped. I tried to remember all of the good things in my life for a simple distraction. But there weren't many. I was worried about Cato and now for the rest of my family and even for Aidan. There couldn't be any more dead Hadley children because of me.

A few minutes passed before Katniss fell onto the cot next to me. "Where have you been?" I asked, before she could open her mouth.

"Checking on the others," Katniss said, motioning flippantly to a number of other District 13 residents. "Keeps me from thinking about wherever Prim and Mom are."

She was just as worried, if not more, about them as I was. "You know that they'll be in the hospital trying to make sure that everyone is okay before heading down here," I said hopefully.

"That's true. Do - Do you think that they'll be here soon?" Katniss asked fearfully.

"They have to be," I said quickly, knowing that she needed to hear that. "They're not going to leave anyone up there."

"Should we -?"

"No," I interrupted, already well-aware of where she was going with her last comment. "I doubt that they're going to let us go up there. We're safe down here. They're not going to let us risk that."

"Are you okay?" Katniss asked.

"I'm alright. Prim and Mom will be fine. They'll be down here soon."

"I didn't mean them. I meant about Cato."

Of course she was asking about Cato. She was one of the few people who remembered that I still loved him. She was one of the few people who genuinely cared about him. At least, she cared about me and I cared about him. But was I even remotely okay? No. The only reason that I was managing to hold it together was because panicking right now would only make things worse. I needed to be calm right now. But after this was over, I was going to lose it. I needed them to bring Cato back.

"Of course I'm not okay," I said, a humorless laugh escaping me. "Did you see him?"

"I did," Katniss said softly.

"He looks terrible. It looks like he's about to collapse and die. They're treating him like dirt," I said brokenheartedly.

Katniss laid a hand on my shoulder and brought me into a tight hug. "He might not look good right now and he might not be good when he gets back here, but it's all going to be okay," Katniss promised. I nodded absentmindedly. "After this, I think that they might be going to get him."

Now that drew my attention. "Really?" I asked hopefully.

"Yes."

"Why's that?"

Katniss gave a small smile. "They're no fools. They know that you're hurting over his state. They know that you're going to stop working with them if they continue to ignore Cato's condition. Especially since they know that you've seen him this time around. They can't risk losing you," Katniss said. I nodded at her. She was right. I was not going to continue doing what they wanted without Cato here. "So they're going to go after him."

"A rescue mission," I breathed.

"I think so."

"I have to go and help him," I said suddenly.

If someone was going to save him, it had to be me. After all, I was the one who had landed him there in the first place. Katniss shook her head. "They won't let you go. Setting foot in the Capitol, where you're a wanted criminal, would be stupid," she pointed out.

"But I have to help him."

"And you will, the moment that Cato comes back. He's going to need help and you're the only person who will be able to do that."

"Thanks, Cat." I noticed that she was fidgeting slightly. "Are you okay?"

"Getting nervous."

"Me too. But it'll be okay."

"It will, Aspen. You have to keep reminding yourself of that."

She was right about that. I did have to keep reminding myself of that. Things would eventually be okay. I would get Cato back and the war would end. We would never have to deal with another Hunger Games again. Snow would be dead. There were plenty of things that we would never be able to fix - Leah, Cinna, and District 12 to name a few - but there were a number of things that would make all of this worth it. And eventually I would be able to have a real life.

Eventually things would be okay. Not today and not tomorrow, but we would be okay. All of us. There was nothing left to say after that. We merely waited together in silence with our hands tightly clasped around each other. I was just starting to get anxious, as Katniss clearly was, when Ms. Everdeen appeared. Katniss and I jumped to our feet and dashed over to her. I looked behind her into a sea of strangers. Prim was nowhere to be seen.

"Mom!" Katniss gasped.

"Where's Prim?" I asked.

"Isn't she here?" she replied.

My stomach churned in knots. Where the hell was she, if not with Ms. Everdeen? "No, she's not. We thought that she was with you," Katniss breathed nervously.

"She's not?" I asked, my voice shaking.

"She was supposed to come straight down from the hospital. She left ten minutes before I did. Where is she? Where could she have gone?" Ms. Everdeen asked quickly.

"Katniss... Where the hell did she go?" I asked.

If not the hospital with Ms. Everdeen, where would she have gone? People were still rushing in... She could have gotten caught up. But there was no way. She had to be doing something else. I squeezed my lids shut tight for a moment, to track her as I would prey on a hunt. See her react to the sirens, rush to help the patients, nod as they gestured for her to descend to the bunker, and then hesitate with her on the stairs. Torn for a moment. But why?

My eyes flew open at the same time as Katniss's. "The cat! She went back for him!"

"Oh, no," Ms. Everdeen gasped.

"No! Not the damned cat!" Katniss shouted, realizing it at the same moment.

"We have to get her!" I shouted.

So I moved before thinking any better of it. Katniss was on my heels within the second. "Katniss! Aspen!" Ms. Everdeen hissed, dashing after us. "Come back!"

We both knew that I was right. I knew it, Katniss knew it, and Ms. Everdeen knew it. We were pushing against the incoming tide, trying to get out of the bunker. She had to be towards the top of Thirteen. If she was still up there when the attack started, there was no way that she would ever survive it. It only made me move faster. Up ahead, I could see them preparing to shut the thick metal doors. In just a few minutes, as the voice was warning from outside of the bunker.

The guards were slowly rotating the metal wheels on either side inward. They were shutting the main door and leaving only the side doors open. Somehow I knew that once they had been sealed, nothing in the world would convince the soldiers to open them. Perhaps it would even be beyond their control. I was indiscriminately shoving people aside as I shouted for them to wait. The space between the doors shrank to a yard, a foot; there were only a few inches left when I jammed my hand through the crack.

"Open it! Let me out!" I cried.

"Open the damn doors!" Katniss shouted, coming up to my other side.

"The attack is beginning," a District 13 guard told us.

"I don't care!" I shouted.

Consternation showed on the soldiers' faces as they reversed the wheels a bit. Not enough to let me pass, but enough to avoid crushing my fingers. They were staring at me with wonder. I knew what they were weighing in their head. Giving the Mockingjay what she wanted and potentially endangering herself, or ignoring her request and potentially losing her obedience if something were to happen to Prim. Either way, I took the opportunity to wedge my shoulder into the opening.

"Prim!" I hollered up the stairs. Ms. Everdeen pleaded with the guards as I tried to wriggle my way out. "Prim!"

"Prim!" Katniss shouted.

"Prim! Call back to me!" I screamed desperately.

She had to be close. Then I heard it. The faint sound of footsteps on the stairs. "We're coming!" I heard her call.

"Hold the door!" That was Gale.

"They're coming!" I told the guards, and they slid the doors open about a foot.

"Prim, get over here!" Katniss yelled at her sister.

There was a brief silence and I heard her footsteps hesitating. What was she doing? Why wasn't she coming? "Buttercup!" Prim gasped suddenly.

Then there was a brief scuffle and I heard her footsteps fading. Katniss and I turned to each other, both of us as white as a sheet. "Oh my god, she hasn't gotten the cat yet. She's going back to the compartment," I breathed.

"We have to get her," Katniss said, tears filling her eyes.

"Aidan!" I shouted up the hallway. There was no response. "Is he here?"

"He was with Prim," Ms. Everdeen said.

"Damn it. Move!" I yelled to the guards.

Two of them jumped out of our way in surprise. They must not have thought that we would really do it. As I darted out into the hallway, Katniss right on my heels, I realized that a lot more people weren't down in the bunker than I had initially thought. It was actually a good thing that we had escaped. Not everyone was underground. Maybe they were planning on opening the doors again once everyone was downstairs. I supposed that it didn't matter.

It took us just under a minute to make a dead sprint up the stairs and towards the dining room. Maybe there was the tiniest chance that we could head her off before she got to our compartment. That was our one chance. We had to get her before she got upstairs. Together Katniss and I trampled people and threw them out of our way. They looked shocked but no one tried to stop us. Eventually we broke through into the completely abandoned dining room.

"Prim! Prim!" Katniss yelled as we ran in.

"Prim! Prim, where are you?" I shouted.

There was no answer. "Prim!" Katniss yelled, turning in a slow circle.

There was no sign of her. We hadn't made it in time. "Aidan! Aidan!" I tried. There was still no response. I wasn't sure if they could even hear me over the sirens. "Are you here? Aidan!"

The two of us stared at each other, horrified that we still couldn't find or hear them. "Proceed to your nearest stairwell and descend to level 40. Blast doors will be sealed in six minutes," the air raid drill repeated.

As in, we needed to be there in six minutes or we were dead. "We need to move. We don't have much time," I told Katniss.

"She sounded close before."

There was a good chance that she had been right there before realizing that she had forgotten the damn cat. "She was passing, coming back from the hospital. She must have been headed towards Compartment E," I said breathlessly. "Come on, let's see if we can cut her off."

"Aidan?" Katniss asked.

"Hopefully he's with her," I said.

Terrified that we might already be too late, Katniss and I turned and sprinted back out of the dining room. To our horror, we were completely blocked from heading back upstairs. Maybe there was a chance that Prim had been blocked, too. That meant that she would be back downstairs. Knowing that it was our only chance, Katniss and I followed the flow of people who were heading down to the bunker, frantically looking for Prim and Aidan.

"This is a code red alert," the air raid drill continued. "Please, remain calm and begin evacuation protocol. Proceed in an orderly fashion to your nearest stairwell and descend to level 40."

Katniss and I briefly stopped and glanced down the triangular staircase that went straight down to the bunker. Katniss and I stared at each other in horror. Everyone was moving in a steady stream, not hesitating or panicking. There was no way that we would be able to pick out Prim in the crowd. Everyone looked the same. We only hesitated for a moment longer before Katniss grabbed my arm and pulled me along with her again.

"This is a code red alert. Please, remain calm and begin evacuation protocol. Proceed in an orderly fashion to your nearest stairwell and descend to level 40. Blast doors will close in four minutes."

Just as the air raid drill warned us that there were a mere four minutes before the blast doors closed, there was a horrible lurch from the outside of Thirteen. Everyone was suddenly thrown off of their feet. I realized very quickly what was happening. Cato was right. The Capitol had been planning an attack and he had given us the warning that we needed. I prayed to everything that I could think of that Prim hadn't been upstairs during the first of the attacks.

"We're running out of time," I shouted to Katniss.

"Hurry up. Let's go," she called back, pulling me to my feet.

"Prim!" I screamed at the top of my lungs.

The moment that I was back on my feet, another blast came. This one was even heavier than the one before. I could only assume that the Capitol bombers were getting closer. To my horror, that time, the lights went out. They had damaged one of the electrical outlets. Even worse, they had fractured the shell of Thirteen. Water began pouring down the stairwell, quickly soaking through our jumpsuits. That was when the screams began.

I could hardly see Katniss. The only thing illuminating her was the strobe of the emergency lights. "What the hell is happening?" Katniss asked.

There was another bomb that threw everyone back to the ground. I waited a moment before slowly climbing back to my feet and grabbing Katniss's hand. "One of the blasts probably made a dent in the shell of Thirteen. Come on. We've only got four minutes to find Prim and Aidan!" I shouted back to her.

The two of us barely got a chance to get back to our feet before the real panic started. Knowing that they had a limited amount of time to avoid the blasts from the incoming bombs, the remainder of Thirteen was sent into a frenzy. They began screaming and shoving each other down the staircase. To my surprise, Katniss was thrown straight off of her feet and I followed, having been holding her hand. We both collapsed down a few stairs before landing painfully sprawled out.

People barely noticed us as they stomped over our practically useless bodies. My back, hips, and legs were throbbing from the impact, as was my head, considering the people kept kicking me as they passed. Katniss rolled slightly and I moved to the edge of the staircase, pressing my nose down into the riser and throwing my arms over the back of my neck, hoping that no one would kill me. A few seconds passed before someone grabbed at my arms.

"Come on," they said. "Come on."

It was an older woman who was trying to help Katniss and I get back to our feet. We both glanced up to see that the staircase was now almost completely empty. She helped us get ahead of her and continue to sprint down the staircase. For just a moment I had forgotten about Prim and Aidan. I had almost completely forgotten why we had left the bunker in the first place. Right now, I could only hope that they had managed to make their way back here already.

"Continue to the Supply Station and claim one pack for each member of your compartment. Please keep all personal items within your assigned area. Be courteous to your fellow citizens. This is a code red alert. All citizens should be inside the bunker. Blast doors will close in two minutes."

Down in the bunker once more, Katniss and I ran through the crowd, desperate to find where Prim and Aidan had gone. I hadn't seen them on the staircase but the way up to Compartment E had been blocked. Maybe they had been forced back downstairs before Katniss and I had left the dining room. Throwing people out of my way, I dashed through the crowd back to our assigned area, whispering over and over again that they had to be there now.

"Mom!" Katniss shouted.

"Where's Prim?" I asked, still not spotting her.

"Aspen!" Alana yelled, coming to my side.

"You didn't find her?" Ms. Everdeen asked.

"We were headed off. They closed the upstairs sleeping areas before we got there. We thought that she had turned back around. They're not here?" I asked desperately.

"She must still be on the stairs," Ms. Everdeen gasped.

"There's no one on the stairs," Katniss said.

Neither one of us bothering to say another word, we turned and sprinted out of the bunker again. I could hear the others following us, but I didn't care enough to turn back. They were safe. Katniss and I were in a dead panic, throwing people out of our way as we headed up the ramp and back out of the blast doors. While the guards were able to stop the rest of the Hadley family and Ms. Everdeen, they missed the two of us.

"Prim! Aidan!" I screamed desperately.

"Soldier Everdeen! Soldier Antaeus! We need to get you to the bunker!" one of the guards called after us.

"Come on!" Katniss yelled back to me.

"Hey, stop! Stop!" a guard shouted.

"Blast doors will close in one minute."

But it didn't stop either one of us. Even if it killed me, I had to find Prim and Aidan. I had to keep them safe. They were family. The two of us darted into the stairwell and glanced up for one moment. In the darkness, I couldn't see whether or not Prim or Aidan were there. The two of us rushed up the stairs, slipping and sliding on the now-soaked staircase. I was exhausted from the trips up and down the stairs, but I didn't dare stop. They had to be close.

"Blast doors will close in thirty seconds."

"Prim! Prim!" Katniss yelled.

"Prim! Aidan!" I screamed.

Had we somehow missed them? Were they down in the bunker? Were they already dead? Right then, a call sounded throughout the staircase. "Katniss! Aspen!" Prim shouted.

We both hesitated for just a moment to stare at each other. She was still alive. She was coming. We were going to be fine. I still couldn't see her as I glanced up the stairs. The emergency lights weren't enough for me to see through. Tears were flooding my vision as I searched for her. The moment that I was sure that we were back, safe and sound, in the bunker, I was going to kill her. Or maybe the cat, if she had even managed to grab him.

"Aspen!" Aidan's voice called.

"Aidan!" I shrieked in relief. "Prim!"

They were both alive. They were both going to make it. I glanced upwards again, covering my eyes with my hands, desperate to see any sign of either one of them. We didn't even have thirty seconds left. They weren't going to hold those doors. If we weren't down there, we were going to be killed from the bombs. At that same moment, I saw Prim and Aidan bounding down the stairs. Aidan had his arms around her, trying to practically drag her with her.

"This is a code red alert."

"Katniss!" Prim shouted again.

"Aspen!" Aidan called.

"Hurry up! Come on!" I screamed up to them.

"Blast doors will close in fifteen seconds."

We were almost out of time and still almost a floor up. I leaned down on my knees to see the two of them sprinting down the stairs, Prim just slightly slower. That was when I saw that they weren't alone. Someone else was with them, and it was Gale. He had risked his own life to save them... He hadn't even said anything to Katniss or me. He had merely gone after them. Once I was done wringing all of their necks for endangering themselves, I'd have to remember to kill him, too.

"Get down here! Hurry!" Katniss yelled.

"This is a code red alert."

"Come on!" Katniss barked.

"Blast doors will close in ten seconds."

"Move it!" I shouted.

Ten seconds... Was it even possible to make it to the blast doors in ten seconds? It had taken us almost thirty just to get here. But I had to believe that we would make it. Prim came bounding down the stairs with Buttercup tucked safely - albeit very wet - in her arms. Aidan was ushering her down as quickly as possible with Gale behind the two of them. He looked about ready to scoop them up and make a run for it for them.

"Nine... Eight..."

Very slowly Katniss and I backed down the staircase so that we were standing a single level above the landing, just about ten yards from the blast doors. We needed to be ready when it was time to run. I could see the guards turning the gears to the doors, about ready to seal them, whether or not we were on the inside. The doors came into my view as they slowly came closer and closer to locking us out. My heart was pounding as I wiped the rain out of my eyes.

"Come on!" Katniss called.

"Let's go!" I yelled.

"Seven... Six... Five..."

That was when I realized that they wouldn't make it. They were too far behind us and the guards couldn't see that we were coming. They likely couldn't hear us over the rush of water, air raid announcement, and constant sirens. So Katniss and I bounded down the stairs as fast as possible, desperate to ensure that we wouldn't be trapped. I could hear the pounding of the other three sets of feet behind us.

"Hold the doors!" Katniss yelled as we jumped three and four stairs at a time.

"We're coming! Wait!" I screamed as loudly as possible.

"Four... Three... Two..."

"Wait! Hold the doors!"

At that same moment, Katniss and I were the first through the doors. Prim, Aidan, and Gale were just behind us. "We're here! Wait!" I shouted.

"One."

As the air raid siren silenced itself, I glanced back to see that Gale had been forced to slip in through the doors sideways, very nearly getting his shoulder crushed as the doors closed behind us. Gale had an armload of baggage with him that I hadn't noticed before. I wasn't sure what it was, but it must have not been that important as he flung it off to the side. Katniss, Gale, Aidan, Prim, and I all slowed to a steady jog towards the downwards incline into the main area of the bunker.

All five of us finally stopped about halfway through. Behind us I could see guards and a number of other District 13 citizens coming out to see what the problem was. In the meantime, I could hear the doors close with a loud and final clank. Just a second later and we would have been trapped out there. Coin and the guards wouldn't have even stopped to ensure our safety. Just one of a great many things that had always sat poorly with me about her.

Katniss and I both advanced on Prim. "You went back for the cat?" Katniss howled.

"What were you thinking?" I shouted.

My voice cracked from how angry I was. It was already sore from all of the shouting that I had done, searching for them, but right now I was just glad that we had all made it back safely and relatively unharmed - Katniss and I would just be a little bruised and banged up from the tumble down the stairs. Despite being furious with her for her foolishness, I gave Prim an angry shake and then hugged her tighter than I ever had, squashing Buttercup between us.

Katniss and I didn't dare let up on her until I heard another voice. "Aidan!" Alana's scream echoed through the bunker.

Aidan bashfully stepped forward. "Mom -"

"What the hell are you thinking?" Alana snarled, looking very much like a fully-grown bear. She shook and hugged Aidan much in the same way that we had just done with Prim. "It was a drill! You could have been locked out there!"

"Mom, I'm sorry," Aidan apologized, pulling out of his mother's crushing grip. "Prim remembered her cat and I didn't want to let her go back to them alone. Thank you, Aspen."

Remembering that it hadn't just been Prim that I had been so desperate to save, I rushed over to Aidan and kneeled down to his level, bringing him into a bone-crushing hug. He was almost as tall as me, but right now it felt like he was a toddler. It reminded me that he was still just a kid. Aidan wrapped his arms around my thin waist. I could feel that he was shaking. Not from anger or exhaustion, but from fear. Even though what we had just gone through was terrifying, I had never felt closer to him.

When we finally pulled apart, I brushed Aidan's wet hair off of his forehead. "Whether or not you like me, Aidan, you're my brother. I'm not going to let anything happen. Are you okay?" I asked.

"I'm - I'm fine," Aidan stuttered.

Alana walked in between the two of us, pulling me into a tearful hug. "Thank you, Aspen," Alana sobbed.

"You're welcome," I said.

"Prim, are you okay?" Aidan asked.

Katniss's hands were still on her sister's shoulders. She looked like she was in between squeezing the life out of her with a hug or grabbing her bow to shoot her. Prim looked like she was about to faint. I walked over to her and grabbed her shoulder again, trying to keep Prim calm and calm Katniss down. This was the wrong place to fight about stupidity. Prim's explanation as to what she had done was already on her lips.

"Y - Yes. I couldn't leave him behind, Katniss. I wasn't gonna leave him," Prim cried, her voice cracking. "Not twice. You should have seen him pacing the room and howling. He'd come back to protect us."

"Okay. Okay," I said breathlessly.

It was from even more than the dash up and down the staircase as many times as we had. If I never saw those staircases again it would still be too soon. Trying to calm myself down, and Katniss, who still looked like she might lose it, I pushed my wet hair back from my forehead. Folding my arms over my chest and taking a few more breaths to calm myself, I stepped back and lifted Buttercup by the scruff of the neck. The cat instantly started crying.

"I should've drowned you when I had the chance," I growled.

"I'm still going to drown you," Katniss added.

Clearly Buttercup hadn't appreciated either one of our insults. His ears flattened and he raised a paw. Both Katniss and I hissed before he got a chance, which seemed to annoy him a little, since he considered hissing his own personal sound of contempt. It seemed that we were back to our classic routine of hating each other and constantly trying to abuse each other. In retaliation, Buttercup gave a helpless kitten mew that brought Prim immediately to his defense.

"Oh, Aspen, Katniss, don't tease him," Prim said, folding him back in her arms. "He's already so upset."

The two of us exchanged a look with each other. I was really going to skin the cat and offer him up for dinner one night. That was, if we and the rest of Thirteen were going to survive the attack. The idea that I had wounded the brute's tiny cat feelings just invited further taunting. But Prim was genuinely distressed for him. So instead, I visualized Buttercup's fur lining a pair of gloves, an image that had helped me deal with him over the years.

"Okay, sorry," Katniss mumbled.

"We're all sorry. Just... don't run off like that again. Either one of you," I snapped at both Aidan and Prim. Both gave me embarrassed nods. "Always make sure that someone is either with you or that they know where you are."

They were still just kids. "Okay," Aidan muttered.

"Okay," Prim agreed.

"Blast doors are now sealed."

Obviously... "Let's go," Katniss muttered.

We had nearly been crushed by the blast doors, did they really feel the need to announce it? We all glanced around at each other. Hopefully we had been the last people in District 13 to have to make it down to the bunker. That was when we started hearing it. The gentle rumbles of what were likely the weaker of the bombs that the Capitol was dropping. We both glanced up before I placed a hand behind Aidan's back, Katniss's on Prim's, leading the two of them away from the doors.

"We're under the big E on the wall. Better get him settled in before he loses it," I told Prim.

Prim hurried off, Katniss with her, likely to get a nice talking-to from Ms. Everdeen and I found myself face-to-face with Gale. I had almost forgotten that he was here with us. He was holding the box of medical supplies from our kitchen in Twelve. Site of our last conversation, kiss, fallout, whatever. My game bag was slung across his shoulder. At least he had thought to bring all of those things. That had been his thought, rather than getting himself to safety.

"If Cato's right, these didn't stand a chance," Gale said.

Cato. Blood like raindrops on the window. Like wet mud on boots. The two of us stared at each other for a long while, still firmly planted in our spots in the run down into the bunker. For a moment I thought about leaning forward and hugging him. Mostly because I was thrilled that he clearly still cared enough to check on us. Instead of giving Gale the hug that I so desperately wanted to, I merely stood and stared at him awkwardly.

"Thanks for... everything," I muttered dumbly.

The two of us stared at each other for a while longer. We really didn't have anything to say to each other right now. Nothing that we wanted to say out here, anyways. I didn't want to have to have the talk about our awkward kiss back in Twelve in front of a number of people who could hear. So instead I leaned forward and took our stuff. I wondered if Gale had also grabbed all of the things from Cato that were sitting up on the dresser.

"You're welcome," Gale said stiffly.

"Your family okay?" I asked, having not spotted the rest of the Hawthorne's in all of the panic.

"They're fine. Yours?"

"Now that Prim and Aidan are back, everyone's fine. Looks like we might not lose anyone in the attack."

"Yeah. It's good."

We said nothing for a little while. "What were you doing up in our rooms?" I finally asked.

"Just double-checking," he said.

"Thanks for that."

Gale gave a sharp nod. "We're in Forty-Seven if you need me."

After that he turned on his heels and walked away, not bothering to wait and see if I was going to follow him. And I didn't. I had a feeling that Gale really didn't want to see me right now. And I really didn't want to have to have another awkwardly forced conversation with him. Mostly because of our last very tense conversation. I had noticed that, since the visit and kiss in District 12, neither one of us had really been able to look the other in the eye. Eventually I wandered back to my own space.

Practically everyone withdrew to their spaces when the doors shut, so I got to cross to our new home with at least five hundred people watching me. I tried to appear extra calm to make up for my frantic crashing through the crowd and dash up the stairs. Like that was fooling anyone. So much for setting an example. Oh, who cared? They all thought that I was nuts anyway. One man, who I thought I had knocked to the floor, caught my eye and rubbed his elbow resentfully. I almost hissed at him, too.

Once I was sure that no one was going to commit me to the temporary hospital wing - as in, the mental ward - I went to check on everyone else. Katniss, Prim, and Ms. Everdeen were sitting on their bunks as I walked around our tiny area. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but I couldn't just sit still. Katniss was mostly sitting with Prim attached at her hip. I knew that she was furious with her younger sister after what she did with the cat. But they would be just fine.

Ms. Everdeen was also fine. In fact, she seemed to be one of the calmest people in the bunker. Came from being a nurse, I supposed. She had been in the hospital earlier to help everyone figure things out. They all looked just fine. The people who were taken out of the hospital were fine and most of them were resting now. There were only a few people with minor injuries from the mad dash to the bunker. They were all being taken care of by the rest of the nurses.

To my surprise, Cato's family were oddly demure. It was shocking, considering that they were normally loud and boisterous at any time. Maybe it was because they were all thinking about what was becoming of their brother and son. Or maybe it was their panic at almost losing Aidan. My stomach roiled with guilt again. They were stuck down here, hiding from the incoming attack, while Cato was suffering the consequences of trying to protect us.

The family were all trying to work to keep their minds off of what was happening to Cato. Carrie was mostly trying to keep Marley quiet and calm. Most of the kids were having a hard time with being this far underground. Alana and Damien were clearly just glad that Aidan was safe. Aidan himself was trying to ignore his mother, who kept making sure that he was okay. Dean was consistently twiddling his fingers. He, like many of the rest of us, clearly felt useless just sitting here.

After a while I realized that there was nothing else that I could do with them. They were all simply waiting for the attack to subside. So I headed off to check on Gale's family. He had told me that they were fine, but I had to see so for myself. They still seemed okay. They were trying to keep Posy calm during the attack. Her ears were apparently hurting her. Rory and Vick seemed alright, thankfully. Gale kept giving me a side-eye, but I was trying to look away.

We had been down in the bunker with the doors sealed for almost half an hour when I finally walked back over to my family. Prim had Buttercup installed on the lower bunk, draped in a blanket so that only his face poked out. That was how he liked to be when there was thunder, the one thing that actually frightened him. Ms. Everdeen put her box carefully in the cube. I crouched, my back supported by the wall, to check what Gale managed to rescue in my hunting bag.

The plant book, both Katniss and I's hunting jacket, her parents' wedding photo, the photo of my parents, and the personal contents of my drawer. My Mockingjay pin now lived with Cinna's outfit, but there was the gold locket, mine and Cato's wedding rings, and the silver parachute with the spile and Cato's pearl. I knotted the pearl into the corner of the parachute, buried it deep in the recesses of the bag, as if it was Cato's life and no one could take it away as long as I guarded it.

To my surprise, there were even the few things that Cato's family had given me. The picture of the two of us in the cave after the fire and his portrait of me from the afternoon on the rooftop garden before the Games. It surprised me that of the many things that Gale could have thought to grab, he had grabbed most of the things that would remind me of Cato. No matter what, Gale had always cared for my happiness, regardless of what it had meant for his own.

After almost an hour of being below-ground in the bunker, there was another change. The faint sound of the sirens cut off sharply. Everyone glanced up as Coin's voice came over the District audio system, thanking us all for an exemplary evacuation of the upper levels. She stressed that this was not a drill, as Cato Hadley, the District 2 Victor, had possibly made a televised reference to an attack on Thirteen tonight.

That was when the first real bomb hit. The first one that had hit right above Thirteen. Everyone was thrown onto their backs, kids crying and adults screaming. I scrambled back onto the bed with Katniss, Prim, and Ms. Everdeen - the four of us all crushed on the bed together, Buttercup in between us. There was an initial sense of impact followed by an explosion that resonated in my innermost parts, the lining of my intestines, the marrow of my bones, and the roots of my teeth.

With each impact of the bombs, the entire bunker would shake and the lights would flicker. Everyone would scream and close their eyes, praying that the ceiling wouldn't collapse down around us. I had an arm wrapped over Prim's shoulder, my hands painfully tight around Katniss's. We're all going to die. There was no way that the bunker could take these impacts. With each bomb dust was shaken from the roof of the bunker and people were tossed around.

My eyes slowly turned upward, expecting to see giant cracks race across the ceiling, massive chunks of stone raining down on us, but the bunker itself gave only a slight shudder. The lights went out and I experienced the disorientation of total darkness. Speechless human sounds - spontaneous shrieks, ragged breaths, baby whimpers, one musical bit of insane laughter - danced around in the charged air. My heart lodged itself in my throat.

Then there was a hum of a generator, and a dim wavering glow replaced the stark lighting that was the norm in Thirteen. It was closer to what we had in our homes in Twelve, when the candles and fires burned low on a winter's night. I was panting tiredly when I glanced up and saw that a crack was finally starting to form in the ceiling from the constant hail of bombs. Right above where our bunk was... I slipped back onto the bunk, trying to let my damp hair help calm down my burning forehead.

"You okay?" I asked Katniss over the screams of everyone else.

"Feel too trapped down here," Katniss breathed.

"Me too."

"How's everyone else?"

"They're fine. Just glad that we got a warning," I mumbled.

"Yeah."

To my surprise, there was one person who looked as calm as he always did. Seneca walked over and took a seat at the edge of the bed. "Aspen. Miss Everdeen," he greeted.

"Mr. Crane," Katniss said awkwardly.

She still hadn't gotten over everything. "Glad to see that you made it down here safe and sound," I said.

Seneca nodded blankly. I couldn't remember if he had come down here with us the first time. I was still too frazzled. "We all saw what you did earlier. Making the fools move to run and find your sister," Seneca told me.

"I couldn't leave her," I said quickly.

Seneca let out a puff of air, smiling at me. I raised a brow, unsure of what he was smiling about. "Exactly what makes you the perfect Mockingjay," Seneca said. I raised a brow, not understanding. "That very fact that you don't think before you act. We have so many planners and thinkers in this war. What we really need is someone who channels their emotions and acts on them. That's what we have in you."

Someone who channeled their emotions and acted on them... That was certainly what I did. That was half of the reason that we were all here in the first place. My ultimate attraction and love for Cato. My anger during the private training sessions. My reactions to Peeta and Rue's deaths. My words in Eleven during the Victory Tour. The arrow into the dome of the arena that had sent my life into a downwards spiral. All stupid actions that I hadn't thought through.

"What do you think that they're doing to Cato?" I asked suddenly.

Seneca seemed to debate for a moment whether or not to tell me what he really thought. "Likely punishing him for what happened in his interview," Seneca finally admitted honestly. "They won't be happy that he essentially sabotaged their well-planned attack. We would have had no idea about it if not for him. Not in time, at least."

"Will that help the case to get him out of the Capitol?" I asked.

"I believe so. It won't go unnoticed by Coin that Cato is the only reason that we were able to evacuate Thirteen."

That was what I had been hoping for. "But will she even care?"

Seneca gave me a gentle smile. "I'll force her to care," he said.

"Thank you," I said.

The two of us gave each other a brief smile. If there was one person that I genuinely believed would fight to bring Cato back - who actually had some weigh with Coin - it was Seneca. I was about to open my mouth to speak again when another bomb hit. Everyone screamed again as they were thrown onto their backs. I fell half on Seneca, who kept a hand on my arm until the lights had come back on. I could see Prim practically attached at the hip to Katniss and Ms. Everdeen.

"Are you alright?" I asked softly once the lights had flickered back on.

Seneca released me once we were sure that the attack had abated for now. "Not surprised by the attack in the slightest. It's just a good thing that we got the warning," Seneca said.

"At what cost?" I growled.

"A great cost," Seneca said, grabbing my hand. I turned to him slowly. "But not everything. He's going to live, Aspen. We'll have him back soon enough."

Soon was not soon enough. "Do you think they'd let me go on the rescue mission?" I asked slowly.

"Absolutely not," Seneca said immediately. "They'll never let you set foot outside of Thirteen. At least, not without going to a safer place or having an entourage of armed escorts."

"I landed him there. I want to be the one to get him back," I argued.

"They'll send highly trained individuals to get him back. There's no chance that they'll fail the mission when it comes time."

"Comes time..."

"We have to survive the attack and get out of here first." Would we be able to survive the attack? It seemed very unlikely right now. "How's Aidan?" Seneca asked, probably to distract me.

Glancing over towards the Hadley's, I noticed that Aidan was still being closely watched by his parents. "Probably being reamed by his mother, something that I'm sure will happen for the rest of his life, but he's okay. We got them both back here in time and that's what matters," I answered.

"We're all glad to see the two of them back," Seneca said.

"Thanks." The two of us sat together in silence for a little while, jumping and tensing up again every time one of the bombs dropped again. Almost ten minutes passed before Seneca made a move to get up. "What are you doing?" I asked curiously.

Seneca turned back and gave the slightest of smiles. I raised a brow. "Heading back to the lower control rooms soon. Making sure that the building can still sustain the attacks by the Capitol," Seneca explained. My stomach started churning in knots. Were we really in that much danger? "They're heavy explosives."

"Can we survive it?"

"Yes."

There was just the slightest hesitation in his voice. "Are you sure?" I asked carefully.

"We'll try our damnedest. It's not the bombs that we're worried about."

"So what are we worried about?"

"How much air we have down here," Seneca said. My eyes sprang open. I hadn't even bothered to think about whether or not we had air down here. "This isn't like the rest of District 13. Air isn't freely filtered through here. We're so far down that the air down here is on backup generators. The air will only last so long."

Everything that Seneca was saying made perfect sense. I hadn't even thought about whether or not we would actually need some air down here. I didn't think about the fact that we needed air. It begged the question of how long we could survive down here without the air filtration system constantly running. Would we even be warned when the air started to run out? Suffocating to death or being killed by falling bombs. Which one sounded a little more appealing?

"When do we run out?" I asked.

"Best not to think about it. Either way, you'll know when," Seneca breathed.

"I suppose that's true."

"I need to get back to the control station."

"Okay. Drop by whenever."

Seneca gave a somewhat awkward smile. The tense air of the previous conversation was still weighing on us. "The same goes to you. Especially if you need a change of scenery," Seneca offered.

"Thanks. See you later," I said.

The two of us grabbed each other's hands for a moment to give them a tight squeeze. We were all going to be able to make it through this. I genuinely believed that. As Seneca headed off towards the Control Center - where he was likely going to be able to have a conversation about what was happening above ground - I got off of the spare cot and headed back over to my family. I dropped down on the cot alongside Katniss, Prim, and Ms. Everdeen.

For a while we all simply sat in silence. Either listening to the bombs, fearfully pressing our heads into the other's shoulders, simply waiting for the bombs to stop dropping. Almost an hour had passed that we sat in silence when I reached for Prim in the twilight, clamping my hand on her leg, and pulling myself over to her. Katniss grabbed for my hand and I wrapped my own around her, pulling her into us. Prim's voice remained steady as she crooned to Buttercup.

"It's all right, baby, it's all right. We'll be okay down here."

Prim likely sounded more confident than everyone else put together. I could see Katniss glancing up to the cracks in the roof. To try and distract her from it, I grabbed her around the shoulder and pulled her against my own. After hesitating for a moment, she rested her forehead against my arm. Ms. Everdeen reached over our backs and wrapped her arms around us. I allowed myself to feel young for a moment and rested my head on her shoulder. Prim was leaning against my chest.

No one spoke for a long time. We all simply sat together and prayed that the bunker was strong enough to take the impacts, and continue to take them. There was a rather huge blast from a bomb that must have hit directly over us. Screams echoed all throughout the bunker as I unwittingly pressed my face into Ms. Everdeen's shoulder. Much like the way that a small child would run to a parent for help. Ms. Everdeen simply pressed her hand against the back of my head, like she had when I was young.

Once the bombs had abetted, I glanced up. "That was nothing like the bombs in Eight," I said.

"And those were bad enough," Katniss mumbled.

"Yeah, they were," I agreed.

"Probably a bunker missile," Prim said, keeping her voice soothing for the cat's sake.

"How do you know?" I asked curiously.

"We learned about them during the orientation for new citizens," Prim explained.

"Did we?" Katniss asked curiously.

Obviously she had paid about as much attention in classes as I had. "You were at Aspen's side in the hospital for orientation. I think you slept through the truncated one that they gave you and Gale afterwards. They're designed to penetrate deep in the ground before they go off. Because there's no point in bombing Thirteen on the surface anymore," Prim explained.

"Nuclear?" I asked, feeling a chill run through me.

"Not necessarily. Some just have a lot of explosives in them. But... it could be either kind, I guess," Prim said.

What had Seneca said? Could we survive a nuclear blast? Honestly? Probably not. "Did Seneca say that the bunker can survive the blasts?" Katniss asked curiously.

"It can survive the blasts just fine," I said as confidently as possible.

"Is there anything else that we need to worry about?" Prim asked.

Was there even an end to the list of everything that we needed to be worried about? I didn't think so. There was a large range of things that we needed to be concerned about. But the biggest problem right now was the chance that we might suffocate down here. Especially considering how long we might be down here. How long could the Capitol drop bombs on us? How much firepower did they have? How much air did we have? I couldn't burden the others with those worries.

So I said, "No, sweetie. We're going to be fine down here." I brushed the hair back off of Prim's forehead and planted a kiss there. "We just have to wait out the end of the blasts."

Katniss was giving me a scrutinizing look. She clearly didn't believe that there were no problems with us being down here. But she wanted to bother Prim with our real worries about as much as I did, so she, like me, said nothing. We merely sat together and continued to wait out the attack. The gloom made it hard to see the heavy metal doors at the end of the bunker. I wasn't sure why, but I found it very hard to look away from them. Which made no sense, considering how paranoid it made me.

Would they be any protection against a nuclear attack? And even if they were one hundred percent effective at sealing out the radiation, which was really unlikely, would we ever be able to leave this place? The thought of spending whatever remained of my life in this stone vault horrified me. I wanted to run madly for the door and demand to be released into whatever laid above. It was pointless. They would never let me out, and I might have risked starting some kind of stampede.

"We're so far down, I'm sure we're safe," Ms. Everdeen said wanly.

Her face was much paler than I had ever seen before. I reached back and grabbed her hand tightly. For a moment I allowed her to have her weakness. Mostly because I knew exactly what she was thinking. At least, I had a feeling. Was it possible that she was thinking of Mr. Everdeen's being blown to nothingness in the mines? I was. Was this how he was feeling right before he died? Scared... wondering whether or not he would make it through the explosions?

"It was a close call, though," Ms. Everdeen said. She was right. People were barely downstairs when the bombs started. "Thank goodness Cato had the wherewithal to warn us."

The wherewithal... A general term that somehow included everything that was needed for him to sound the alarm. The knowledge, the opportunity, and the courage. And there was also something else that I couldn't define. Cato seemed to have been waging a sort of battle in his mind, fighting to get the message out. Why? The ease with which he manipulated words was his greatest talent. Was his difficulty a result of his torture? Something more? Like madness?

It was enough to make me want to throw up. Was he going to be okay? What the hell were they possibly doing to him? I just had to imagine that it was because of the torture. Perhaps they had hit him so many times that he had some type of brain damage. I wasn't sure whether or not that would be the best case scenario. They could fix that in District 13. I had to believe that. But if it was something worse... What would worse be? Did I want to know?

"If it means protecting Aspen, he'll always do anything possible," Katniss said, her voice breaking me from my thoughts.

Katniss's words echoed in my head for a number of minutes. We simply sat in silence as her words consistently beat against my skull. She was right and that was the thought that pained me. They were all right. Everyone was right, every time that they said it. Cato was going to do anything possible to save me, as much as I wished that he wouldn't do that. But he had proven it time and time again. He would always give anything up for my safety. Even his own.

In fact, I was reasonably certain that he would rather die and leave me alone. In his own mind, it meant that I would finally be allowed to be happy with Gale. But that couldn't ever happen. I needed Cato. He was the one thing that I had never thought that I would need, but now I didn't know how to be without. We had been sitting lazily for nearly an hour when we got some new information. Coin's voice, perhaps a shade grimmer, filled the bunker, the volume level flickering with the lights.

"Apparently, Cato Hadley's information was sound and we owe him a great debt of gratitude. Sensors indicate the first missile was not nuclear, but very powerful. We expect more will follow. For the duration of the attack, citizens are to stay in their assigned areas unless otherwise notified."

We all jumped up into place the moment that she started speaking. I knew what everyone else was thinking. Maybe it meant that we were somehow going to survive the attack - given that we had gotten our warning. But I was thinking something much different. Did Coin's words mean that we were going to be any closer to breaking Cato out of the Capitol to bring him back to Thirteen? He had saved us. But I still couldn't be sure. After all, Coin didn't make any mention of it in her speech.

For much of the next few hours I only thought about Cato and the potential that we might have been ready to get him back. I couldn't stand the thought that we might not be getting him back, even after he had risked his life to save us. To save me. The only thing to break my thoughts of Cato was when a soldier alerted Ms. Everdeen that she was needed in the first-aid station. She was reluctant to leave us, even though she would only be thirty yards away.

"We'll be fine, really," I told her. "Do you think anything could get past him?"

We all glanced down as I pointed to Buttercup, who gave me such a halfhearted hiss, we all had to laugh a little. For the first time since seeing Cato's broadcast a few hours ago, I managed just the tiniest of smiles. Perhaps it was because, for just a moment, things felt right. Buttercup hissing at me because he hated me, and vice versa. Although the weakness in the hiss reminded me of the gravity of the situation. Even I felt a little sorry for him.

After Ms. Everdeen went, I suggested, "Why don't you climb in with him, Prim?"

"I know it's silly... but I'm afraid the bunk might collapse on us during the attack," she said.

"It's not silly," I promised.

Katniss instantly grabbed her sister's hands. Prim's words did have a slight effect on me. She had an almost good point. If the bunks collapsed, the whole bunker would have given way and buried us, but I decided that that kind of logic wouldn't actually be helpful. Instead, I cleaned out the storage cube and made Buttercup a bed inside. As much as I would have rather let the kitchen crew cook him in the stew. Then I pulled a mattress in front of it for Katniss, Prim, and me to share.

A long while passed before we began getting ready for the night. It had been midday when we had gotten Cato's warning. We were given clearance in small groups to use the bathroom and brush our teeth, although showering had been canceled for the day. I curled up with Katniss and Prim on the mattress, double layering the blankets because the cavern emitted a dank chill. Buttercup, miserable even with Prim's constant attention, huddled in the cube and exhaled cat breath in my face.

It was a long time that we all simply laid together. There really wasn't anything else for us to do. Only sit and pretend like there was nothing wrong. No bombs, no missing Cato; we just pretended that things were okay. For a while, I laid there with Prim and Katniss, watching Ms. Everdeen work in the corner. It felt nice to try and relax. Something that none of us got to do that often. But I was also still incredibly nervous. The bombs - although increasingly lessening - were still rattling everyone.

Eventually I got up and left. Not that I was supposed to, but I ignored the many people who were asking me to return to my spot. No one really wanted to fight with me anyways. Maybe it was because I was the Mockingjay. Maybe it was because no one wanted to upset me and see what happened if they did. Or maybe it was because this was the wrong place to be fighting with each other. We all had to stay calm down here. There was no use fighting a losing battle anyways.

Promising Katniss and Prim that I would be back in a little bit, I strolled over towards the Hadley family's compartment. They were practically overflowing. There wasn't enough room for all of them. They all seemed relatively calm, but they also looked petrified. Things like this never happened in Two. Nothing happened there. Not until me... I walked into the middle of their compartment and took a seat in between everyone, without a word. To my surprise, Aidan placed himself nearest me.

Perhaps the two of us were finally starting to learn to get along. There was a long period where we were all silent. There was nothing to say. I merely sat on the ground with my feet tucked underneath me as I picked at the threads of my jumpsuit. The silence wasn't as relaxing as it normally was. Right now it was tense, as everyone was still trying to get themselves settled in for the night. Trying not to panic themselves with Thirteen's condition.

"Sing something," Aidan said suddenly.

We all turned to him in surprise. "You want me to sing something?" I asked.

Aidan nodded slowly. "I think anything's better than the silence, waiting to see if the rest of the Thirteen made it through the attack," he whispered.

And he was right. Anything was better. Even a song, as almost inappropriate as it seemed. The longer that I looked at Aidan, the more that I realized something that should have been obvious. With Cato gone, Aidan had been forced to grow up. He - just like the rest of us - had seen far too much for someone his age. I guiltily shifted in my place, trying to break my train of thought, wondering what I could sing. What wouldn't offend anyone that was sitting near us?

Not 'The Hanging Tree.' Not right now. "What do you want to hear?" I asked Aidan.

Aidan thought about it for a while. "Have you ever written something?" he asked.

Writing music wasn't something that I regularly did. But there was something. "Kind of... When I was in the hospital they would try to get me to do something. To get me out of my drugged and catatonic state, I think. I wrote something. But it was more of a poem. A mishmash of thoughts," I said, realizing that it might have been very dumb.

"Sing it," Dean goaded.

What if it was ridiculous and didn't make sense? What if I upset Cato's family? I had written the song for Cato when I had first gotten here. A little mix of all of the feelings that I had been going through with Cato gone. It had never really meant to be put all together. It had really never been meant for anyone to hear it. It might have been something extremely stupid. I opened my mouth to start singing, but something distracted me.

Dean leaned away from us to reach backwards. He ducked down and grabbed something, pulling it out from underneath one of their beds. My brows arched when I realized what it was. I had seen a number of them before. It was a guitar. This one looked cheaper than most of the other ones that I had seen. There were some amazing players who would come to the Capitol parties. Most of the people who knew how to play in District 12 would strum simple chords. Dean picked it up and began to strum gently.

"You play?" I asked curiously.

Dean nodded. "Cato taught me," he said.

"I - I didn't know that he could play..." I muttered weakly.

Since when had Cato been able to play the guitar? He had never told me that. Was it something that he had always been able to do? "He was looking for something to do when the Games ended. He started to learn to play. He wanted to be able to play while you sang," Skye admitted.

Oh... It must have been something that he had been planning to surprise me with. It would have been a lovely surprise. We would have loved doing that together. It would have been a real moment for us to be a real couple. But maybe now it would never happen. A horrible guilt wracked through me. The same one that had so many times before. I took a deep breath and listened to the gentle strumming that Dean was playing, matching it to the poem that I had written in the best tune that I could.

"I cut you into pieces
Searching for your imperfections
I had plans to make you whole
But all my threads couldn't stop the bleeding
There's nothing left, but I'm not leaving
When all I know is you

"I've been looking for a way
To bring you back to life
And if I could find a way,
Then I would bring you back tonight
I'd make you look, I'd make you lie
I'd take the coldness from your eyes
But you told me, if you love me
Let it die

"Your eyes stare right through me
Ignoring my failed attempts to
Breathe back life into your veins
But I can't start your cold heart beating
You're so far gone, but I'm not leaving
When all I know is you

"I've been looking for a way
To bring you back to life
And if I could find a way,
Then I would bring you back tonight
I'd make you look, I'd make you lie
I'd take the coldness from your eyes
But you told me, if you love me
Let it die

"And you left me more dead
Than you'll ever know
When you left me alone

"I've been looking for a way
To bring you back to life
And if I could find a way,
Then I would bring you back tonight
I'd make you look, I'd make you lie
I'd take the coldness from your eyes
But you told me, if you love me
Let it die

"Let it die
Let it die
Let it die."

My voice dropped off at the end. It had begun to crack with the thought that maybe he was dead. Maybe he had already died. Maybe they had killed him the moment that the broadcast had ended. Dean's guitar eventually faded off as he stopped strumming. My voice was so soft that it would have been almost impossible to hear me, had the bunker not already been almost silent. I realized that everyone was listening to me, not even bothering to pretend that they weren't listening.

"You wrote that?" Carrie asked, finally breaking the silence.

"Most of it. Katniss helped out," I answered.

"It's pretty. Sad, but pretty," Carrie said.

"Thank you," I said blankly. "I'll pass along the message."

There was another lapse of conversation. Aidan eventually reached over and laid a hand on my knee. "I think that Cato would have really liked that one," Aidan whispered.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"Yeah," he confirmed.

It was enough to put a vague smile on my face. "Perhaps when Cato comes out to District 13 you'll be able to play it for him. One day he might even be able to play the guitar along to it," Alana said, forcing a smile on her face.

It was tight-lipped, telling me that she didn't want to smile. She, like me, was desperately concerned about Cato. "That sounds like a good idea," I said softly.

"How's the rest of your family, Aspen?" Damien asked, the only person who looked as normal as ever.

"They're fine. A little nervous, like everyone else, to see what's going to become of Thirteen, but they'll be fine," I answered.

"That's good to hear," Alana said.

"How's Prim?" Aidan asked.

There was a guilty tone in his voice. I smiled and brushed the hair back off of his forehead. "She's fine. Glad that she got Buttercup back. Thank you for going there with her and not leaving her alone. You were very brave," I said softly. Aidan gave me the slightest smile. "Foolish... but brave."

"A trait that Cato's always demonstrated," Dean said fondly.

"It's something that we all have in common," I said, laughing softly at the very true statement. We all did. I slowly rose to my feet and smiled at the family. "Hey, I'll be back in a little bit to check on you."

Alana waved me off. "Don't worry about us, Aspen. We can handle ourselves. Go enjoy some time with the rest of your family," she said, motioning towards Katniss and Prim.

"Thanks. Call out if you need me," I said.

Giving them all hugs and kisses, lingering around Aidan for a moment, I then headed back over to the bunks where the rest of my family was perched. As I walked back over, I could hear a few people humming the song that I was just singing. It almost made me smile. I was glad to distract people, if only for a moment. Once I was back at the bunks, I dropped down besides Prim and Katniss so that the three of us could talk. It was the first time that we had in a while.

Despite the disagreeable conditions, I was glad to have time with Prim and Katniss. Particularly Prim. My extreme preoccupation since I came here - no, since the first Games, really - had left little attention for her. I hadn't been watching over her the way I should, the way I used to. After all, it was Gale who checked our compartment, not me. Something to make up for. Katniss had always been a little different. She was older. It didn't feel like I needed to protect her quite as much as I did Prim.

As the night wore on, the three of us chitchatted about a number of different things. It was nice for us to get to talk to each other the way that we so rarely did. We were all always busy. Katniss with her preparations becoming a real soldier in Thirteen. Prim working at the hospital. Me as the Mockingjay. We didn't dare talk about the attack on Thirteen, the war, or Cato. I realized that I had never even bothered to ask Prim about how she was handling the shock of coming here.

"So, how are you liking Thirteen, Prim?" I offered suddenly.

"Right now?" Prim asked smartly. We all laughed. "I miss home badly sometimes. But then I remember there's nothing left to miss anymore."

"The memories," I put in.

"That's true, I suppose. I feel safer here. We don't have to worry about you. Well, not the same way," Prim said.

"You don't have to worry about me, Prim," I said, brushing her hair back.

Katniss smiled softly, doing the exact same thing to me. "We always will. We just worry about you differently now," she pointed out.

"Don't," I said sharply.

"We do," Prim answered.

Maybe they were always going to worry about me. I wished that they wouldn't. There were so many things to be worried about right now. I was the last person that the others needed to be worried about. There was no need. I could worry about myself. The two of them seemed to know that they had hit a nerve as they stopped speaking, merely settling for the three of us to hold hands. Prim paused for a while, and then a shy smile crossed her lips. I raised a brow curiously.

"I think they're going to train me to be a doctor," Prim said.

It was the first that I had heard of it. Not that I could be surprised. Prim was fantastic with everything medicinal. I remembered thinking it in the first Games. How wonderfully she would have done each time that I was injured. She would have been much better than I had managed myself. Of course she was going to become a doctor. She was just like her mother. Slowly I glanced over at Katniss. One look at her told me that she hadn't heard about it either.

"Well, of course, they are. They'd be stupid not to," Katniss said.

"Congratulations, Prim. You deserve it," I said truthfully.

She would be the best doctor in here. "They've been watching me when I help out in the hospital. I'm already taking the medic courses. It's just beginner's stuff. I know a lot of it from home. Still, there's plenty to learn," Prim told us.

"That's great," Katniss said.

"You'll be the best doctor in here," I said.

Without a doubt, Katniss and I were both telling the truth. She was going to be wonderful. She would make Ms. Everdeen look like an amateur, getting to be trained from this young. I laughed softly, starting to really think things out. Prim getting to be a doctor. She couldn't even dream of it in Twelve. Something small and quiet, like a match being struck, lit up the gloom inside me. That was the sort of future that a rebellion could bring. That would be worth it.

"Are you okay, Katniss?" Prim asked.

"I don't like it down here. It feels too confining," Katniss said.

"That's how I've felt since the moment that I arrived here," I said.

"It's not like District 12," Prim pointed out.

"No, but it's the place that we have to call home for now," I put in. "They've helped us a lot."

Katniss's brows quirked. "Kind of surprised to hear you admit that," she said.

Not long ago, I would have never said anything good about District 13. "I'm still furious with them, but they have helped," I said as honestly as possible. "They got most of us out of that arena. They've helped start the rebellion. They've kept it going."

"That's all you, Aspen," Prim said.

"Maybe... I couldn't have done it without their help though," I said slowly.

"And they couldn't have done it without you," Katniss added.

"Fair enough," I mumbled.

"What about you, Aspen?" Prim asked. I hummed softly at her. "How are you managing?" Her fingertip moved in short, gentle strokes between Buttercup's eyes. "And don't say you're fine."

That was what I had been saying since the very beginning. It was the same thing that I had told everyone over and over again. I was fine. Of course Prim was the person who could see through that. Just the way that Katniss had always been able to. It was true. Whatever the opposite of fine was, that was what I was. It was a long time since I had been fine. So I decided to go ahead and tell them about Cato, his deterioration on-screen, and how I thought that they must have been killing him at that very moment.

Buttercup had to rely on himself for a while, because now Prim turned her attention to me. Pulling me closer, brushing the hair back behind my ears with her fingers. I had stopped talking because there was really nothing left to say and there was this piercing sort of pain where my heart was. Maybe I was even having a heart attack, but it didn't seem worth mentioning. There was no need to make anyone worry about me any more than they already were.

"Aspen, I don't think President Snow will kill Cato," Prim said suddenly.

Despite everything, I smiled at her. It was always nice to hear what Prim had to say. She was always the person to tell me the right thing. Not necessarily the truth. Of course, she said that; it was what she thought would calm me. She was right. The off chance that Snow might not kill Cato was something that calmed me. But it wasn't the truth. We all knew that Snow would kill Cato whenever the moment was right. When it would inflict maximum damage. When I was watching.

"That's a sweet sentiment, Prim," I said.

Katniss threw her arms over my shoulders as a slight shudder ran through my entire body. Up my spine, over my limbs, into the very tips of my fingers and toes. It wasn't because I was cold. It was the thought of what Snow would do to me and to him. I simply spent the next few minutes trying to shake off the sudden chill. I had thought that we might sit in silence for the rest of the night, but Prim's next words came as a surprise.

"If he does, he won't have anyone left you want. He won't have any way to hurt you," Prim said.

Suddenly, I was reminded of another girl, one who had seen all the evil the Capitol had to offer. Johanna Mason, the Tribute from District 7, in the last arena. The one who had sacrificed herself for me, as much as she hated me. I had been trying to prevent her from going into the jungle where the Jabberjay's mimicked the voices of loved ones being tortured, but she brushed me off, saying, 'They can't hurt me. I'm not like the rest of you. There's no one left I love.'

At the time I had been shocked that she would dare say something like that. But now I understood exactly what it was that she meant. It was at that exact moment that I knew that Prim was right, that Snow couldn't afford to waste Cato's life, especially now, while the Mockingjay caused so much havoc. He had killed Cinna already. Destroyed my home. Cato's family was here. Leah was already gone. My family, Gale, Finnick, and even Haymitch were out of his reach. Cato was all he had left.

He had already destroyed so much. He had taken everything from me that was within his reach, with only one exception. He knew that if he killed Cato, he would have officially broken me. I knew that much. I knew that I would lose the will to fight if Cato was dead. He was the one that kept me fighting now. But that was even more useless than using me as a puppet, which was exactly the leverage that he had over me now. I had to watch my step to ensure that Cato still lived.

"So, what do you think they'll do to him?" I asked Prim carefully.

There was a brief silence where I wondered whether or not Prim would actually say anything. Would she try and protect me from what she really thought? That was exactly what I was thinking for a few seconds, until things changed. Because when Prim spoke, she sounded about a thousand years old.

"Whatever it takes to break you."

Chapter 12: Chapter Twelve

What will break me?

That was the question that consumed me over the next three days as we waited to be released from our prison of safety. What was it that President Snow would be able to do that would finally break me into a million pieces so that I was beyond repair, beyond usefulness? What could finally clip my wings as the Mockingjay? I mentioned it to no one, but it devoured my waking hours and weaved itself throughout my nightmares.

The question repeated itself over and over in my head, never changing, but always wondering. What was it that would possibly break me? What, for good, would make me want to stop fighting? There were a number of things that would break me, adding to the cracks in my armor, but there was one thing that would permanently break me. Cato's death. But Prim was so sure that Snow wouldn't kill him. So that continued to beg the question, what was it that would finally break me?

The options were endless. Each one more creative than the next. But what would really break me? What would end it for me? Of course there was the little chance that Snow would just continue to torture Cato, the way that he had been. After all, Snow knew that I wasn't going to make any crazy moves out here while Cato was in his clutches and he could retaliate through him. The question haunted me day in and day out, only bringing me even closer to the brink of collapsing in on myself.

Four more bunker missiles fell over that period where my thoughts were lodged seemingly permanently on my official break. All of the bombs were massive, all very damaging, but there was no urgency to the attack. The bombs were spread out over the long hours so that just when we thought that the raid was over, another blast would send shock waves through your guts. It felt more designed to keep us in lock-down than to decimate Thirteen.

Cripple the district, yes. It would keep all of us from doing anything, at least for the next few days. It would give the people plenty to do to get the place running again once the bombs abetted. But destroy it? No. Coin was right on that point. You didn't destroy what you wanted to acquire in the future. I assumed what they really wanted, in the short term, was to stop the Airtime Assaults and keep me off the televisions of Panem. Which was a good idea on their part, to be fair.

Honestly, everything that they did was a good idea. We received next to no information about what was happening the entire time that we were down in the bunker. Our screens never came on, and we got only brief audio updates from Coin about the nature of the bombs. She told us just enough so that we understood that the bombs were still falling and that it wasn't safe, but nothing more. Certainly, the war was still being waged, but as to its status, we were in the dark.

In the few days that we were down in the bunker, I regularly tried to keep in touch with Cato's family and ensure that they were doing alright. But they, like me, seemed on the edge of becoming permanently unhinged. I could always tell that they weren't completely into the conversations that I started. They were clearly very concerned about Cato's well-being, since we all had no clue whether or not he was still alive after he had given the warning about the incoming attack on Thirteen.

Mostly we all simply checked on the others a few times a day to ensure that we were still okay, but there were a few times that we actually managed to speak with each other. Carrie spent much of her time caring for Marley, who clearly didn't like being down here. Dean was often caught in deep thought. Alana was trying to keep her spirits up as Damien helped care for the entire family. Aidan sat in a stony silence for most of the time. Skye and Julie seemed to be having a hard time keeping it together.

It was rather sad having to sit and watch the family, knowing that there was nothing that I could do to make them feel any better about things. I couldn't help them here. My heart just simply broke for them. But I did often sing at Aidan's request. It was all that I could do to cheer them up. It had recently made me even more of a celebrity. The kids liked listening to me. Apparently it soothed them. But I was starting to run out things to sing to them.

My lack of songs - as 'The Hanging Tree' was a little too morbid to sing a lot - had led to me trying to write some of my own songs. One night I had sat, writing a song with Dean and Julie. They both could play the guitar and they had wanted to help me write a song to raise spirits among everyone. To remind people that things would be over with soon enough and we would be back to normal, back to the war. So I had sang a song that resonated with the rest of the District.

"Is this want you wanted
A world full of ashes
They'll keep on falling
And we're keep on fighting

"But I'm torn up way down deep inside
Still fighting this darkness in me
Another spark and you bring me back to life
This fire it burns and they will see
They will see

"We will take flight
It all ends here tonight
Their ashes have spoken
There's no time to run and hide
If we burn you burns with us
And this fire it rages on
And it's burnin', burnin' for you

"Fuel is what the fire needs
Roses burn just wait to see
Every night they hear us call
Hoping that the reign will fall

"But I'm torn up way down deep inside
Still fighting this darkness in me
Another spark and you bring me back to life
This fire it burns and they will see
They will see

"We will take flight
It all ends here tonight
Their ashes have spoken spoken spoken
There's no time to run and hide
If we burn you burn with us
And this fire it rages on
And it's burnin', burnin', burnin' for you

"And there promise that this life goes on
No matter how much pain we're feeling
It's just hard to comprehend you're gone
Feels like nothing's left worth living
But I'll know that these wounds will heal
And I'll know that this love is real
And I'll know that these wounds will heal
And I'll know that this love is real

"We will take flight
It all ends here tonight
Their ashes have spoken spoken spoken
There's no time to run and hide
If we burn you burns with us
And this fire it rages on
And it's burnin', burnin', burnin' for you."

Most of what I could remember of what had happened immediately after the song had finished was the piercing silence. No one had said anything, but the hope in the air had resonated plain and clear. That we could, and would, win the war. It was the only time that I could remember having some hope the entire time that we had been down in the bunker. The knowledge that we might have hit rock bottom, but we would be okay soon enough. Although that hope had unfortunately quickly faded.

Inside the bunker, cooperation was the order of the day. We adhered to a strict schedule for meals and bathing, exercise and sleep. Small periods of socialization were granted to alleviate the tedium. My visits to the Hadley's, for one. Our space became very popular because both children and adults had a fascination with Buttercup. He attained celebrity status with his evening game of Crazy Cat. Katniss and I created that by accident a few years ago, during a winter blackout.

The game was easy. You simply wiggled a flashlight beam around on the floor, and Buttercup tried to catch it. Most of the time he would bounce off walls to try and get the flashlight, which would frequently cause him to flop painfully on the ground. It usually took him a few seconds to regain his balance before getting back up and darting after the light all over again, seemingly having forgotten exactly what had happened to him just seconds beforehand.

It helped that I was petty enough to enjoy it because I thought that it made him look stupid. Katniss had always shared my thoughts about Buttercup's appearance during the game. Inexplicably, everyone here thought that he was clever and delightful. Even the Hadley's liked him. We were even issued a special set of batteries - an enormous waste - to be used for the purpose of Crazy Cat. The citizens of Thirteen were truly starved for entertainment.

It was on the third night, during our game, that I answered the question eating away at me. Crazy Cat became a metaphor for my situation. The flashlight slowly dropped from my hand as Katniss took over the game, laying a hand on my knee, knowing that I would tell her my problem later. It was so obvious. I was Buttercup. Cato, the thing I wanted so badly to secure, was the light. As long as Buttercup felt he had the chance of catching the elusive light under his paws, he was bristling with aggression.

As much as everyone thought that it was cute, the way that he would hiss and sprint from one end of the room to the other, I knew that he was furious. That was part of the reason that I thought that the game was funny. I knew that he was actually furious at the light. But as for his bristling aggression, that was how I had been since I left the arena, with Cato alive. Knowing that he was less than a thousand miles away, with no way for me to have him in my arms.

When the light went out completely, Buttercup was temporarily distraught and confused, but he recovered and moved on to other things. That was normally how he ended up in bed with Prim at the end of the night. That was also exactly what would happen if Cato died. I would be heartbroken and it would be almost impossible for me to move on, but in the years afterwards, or maybe even decades, I would eventually move on - in my own way, at least.

Perhaps I would never get completely back to normal. In fact, even with Cato back here, I knew that I would never get back to normal, but things would have been better. With Cato dead, at least I would be able to work to end the rebellion and destroy the Capitol. If nothing else, I would have nothing to hold me back. And maybe someday I would be able to move on with Gale. After all, hadn't that been Cato's last wish for me in the arena? Wouldn't he have been happy to see that?

That wasn't even the biggest problem. His death was at least an end, but this just put us at a standstill. Because the one thing that sent Buttercup into a tailspin was when I would leave the light on but put it hopelessly out of his reach, high on the wall, beyond even his jumping skills. He would pace below the wall, wailing horribly, and couldn't be comforted or distracted. He was useless until I shut the light off. It was the only thing that could hold his attention.

That was how I was feeling right now. My attention would never be completely on anything else until I knew what was going to happen with Cato. I had to know, one way or another. It turned out that I was now Buttercup, the very creature that I had spent so long laughing at for his frustration. Because Crazy Cat was what Snow was trying to do to me now, only I didn't know what form his game took. What was his endgame supposed to be here?

Maybe my realization of the game that I was playing these days on my part was all that Snow needed. Thinking that Cato was in his possession and being tortured for rebel information was bad. But thinking that he was being horrifically tortured specifically to incapacitate me was unendurable. It kept me from doing anything without fear of what would come out of my actions. And it was under the weight of that revelation that I truly began to break.

After Crazy Cat, we were directed to bed, as usual. The power had been coming and going; sometimes the lamps burned at full brightness, other times we squinted at one another in the brownouts. At bedtime they turned the lamps to near darkness and activated safety lights in each space. Prim, who had decided the walls would hold up, snuggled with Buttercup on the lower bunk. Ms. Everdeen was on the upper.

As usual, Katniss had come into the same spot that she always did. She laid in my bed on the ground until I actually passed out. After that she would move back into Prim's bunk, shoving Buttercup out of her way. I had offered to take a bunk, but they made me keep to the floor mattress since I flailed around so much when I was sleeping. But for now Katniss laid at my side, saying nothing, simply grasping my hand tightly, knowing that I needed the comfort right now. No words, just her presence.

By the time that she was about to pass out and had moved to Prim's bunk, I was still wide awake. I wasn't flailing now, as my muscles were rigid with the tension of holding myself together. The pain over my heart returned, and from it I imagined tiny fissures spreading out into my body. Through my torso, down my arms and legs, over my face, leaving it crisscrossed with cracks. One good jolt of a bunker missile and I could shatter into strange, razor-sharp shards, never to be put back together again.

All of this was because Cato was gone. All of this was just because I didn't know what was happening to him. What were my actions causing him? I could have never imagined the pain that his absence in my life would cause me. My entire situation had come as a surprise. No part of me had ever thought that I would become so dependent on one person who had once caused me so much stress in my life. What was it that we had said to each other in the first Games?

"What did you cost me again?" I teased.

"A lot of trouble. Don't worry. You'll get it all back," he said.

How had he known, all the way back then, what was eventually going to happen? Did he know what was going to happen or had he just been delirious with a lack of food? Cato certainly had caused me a lot of trouble, in more than one way. In fact, it had been in every way. My panic over his state. My painful love for him. My breaking heart for what was happening to him. It was more trouble than I had ever expected. But I still wouldn't have traded him for the entire world.

When the restless, wiggling majority had settled into sleep, I carefully extricated myself from my blanket and tiptoed through the cavern until I found Finnick, feeling for some unspecified reason that he would understand. He was sitting under the safety light in his space, knotting his rope, not even pretending to rest. I stood in the opening of his bunk and gave Finnick a very weak smile. He barely looked up at me. I noticed the broken skin around his fingers had dripped blood all over his rope.

"Hey. Can I sit?" I asked, motioning to the edge of the bed.

"Yeah," Finnick said.

Positioning myself at the edge of his bed, I went right to the heart of my revelation. "Snow's using Annie to punish you. He's taunting us with them. I didn't understand until just now watching that stupid cat. This is what they're doing to you with Annie, isn't it?" I asked.

As I whispered my discovery of Snow's plan to break me, it dawned on me. That strategy was very old news to Finnick. It was what had broken him. "Well, they didn't arrest her because they thought she'd be a wealth of rebel information. They know I'd never have risked telling her anything like that. For her own protection," Finnick explained.

"Oh, Finnick. I'm so sorry," I said.

"No, I'm sorry. That I didn't warn you somehow," Finnick told me.

It wasn't like Finnick was the only person who had ever lied to me, who hadn't told me the entire truth. No one had told me the truth, save Seneca Crane, who had told me about as close to the truth as he possibly could. But suddenly, a memory surfaced. My head was throbbing as I thought back to one of the worst moments of my life. I was strapped down to my bed on the hovercraft out of the arena, mad with rage and grief after the rescue. Finnick was trying to console me about Cato.

"They'll figure out he doesn't know anything pretty fast. And they won't kill him if they think they can use him against you."

"You did warn me, though. On the hovercraft. Only when you said they'd use Cato against me, I thought you meant like bait. To lure me into the Capitol somehow," I said.

"I shouldn't have said even that. It was too late for it to be of any help to you. Since I hadn't warned you before the Quarter Quell, I should've shut up about how Snow operates." Finnick yanked on the end of his rope, and an intricate knot became a straight line again. "It's just that I didn't understand when I met you. Up on the roof that day. I didn't know what was going through your head with Cato. Not even after the kiss."

That stupid kiss that had only helped send my life into a downward spiral. That first kiss that had started everything. My feelings for Cato had already been growing - and he had admitted that his had been growing towards me - but that kiss had changed something in me. Despite being panicked and surprised for most of it, Cato had managed to weave himself into my brain and cement himself in my heart, and so had begun the beginning of the end.

"Trust me, neither did I," I finally said.

"After your first Games, I still thought the whole romance was an act on your part," Finnick admitted.

"You did?" I asked.

"I figured that you loved him. Everyone did. But no one knew just how deeply that love ran," Finnick said.

So Snow hadn't been completely lying... People really hadn't known that I had loved him. "Really?" I asked.

"We all saw it during the Games. The times that you manipulated him," Finnick pointed out. He was right about that. I had used Cato a few times, but there were also always some feelings in there. "But you were always the girl who had never known love. People thought that you didn't know what he meant to you."

"There were more than a few times that I didn't know myself," I muttered.

"We all expected you'd continue that strategy. But it wasn't until Cato hit the force field and nearly died that I -" Finnick hesitated.

When Cato's heart had nearly stopped, that was the same moment that I had felt like my heart had stopped. I had been so afraid that he was already dead, just mere hours into the Games, after I had tried so hard to keep him alive. I thought back to the arena. How I sobbed when Finnick revived Cato. How I had bordered on hysteria from the moment that Cato had hit the force field. The quizzical look on Finnick's face. The way he excused my behavior, blaming it on my pretend pregnancy.

"That you what?" I prompted.

"That I knew I'd misjudged you. That you do love him. So very much. Maybe even more than I love Annie," Finnick said. I let out a breath. "I'm not saying in what way. Because I know that you still can't let go of someone else."

My heart skipped a beat. Maybe I wasn't as good at masking my emotions as I had once thought that I was. These days I knew that I wore my emotions on my face. But it wasn't pleasing to know that other people did know about what was going on with Gale. I was hoping that no one knew. Of course they did, though. I had even made mention of it during my first Interview that I didn't know how I felt about him. With the cousin game, people had forgotten about him. Or so I had thought.

"Maybe you don't know yourself. But anyone paying attention could see how much you care about him," Finnick said gently.

Anyone? Was that really the truth? It seemed that so many people had always doubted my love for Cato. Even his family seemed to have doubted it before. My own friends and family had. Many of the people in the Districts on the Victory Tour didn't seem to believe that my act had only been an act of love. Haymitch always did say that I was a terrible actress. That was why, on Snow's visit before the Victory Tour, he had challenged me to erase any doubts of my love for Cato.

"Convince me," Snow said.

It seemed, under that hot pink sky with Cato's life in limbo, I finally did. He had seen just how desperate I was to save his life. Not just because I had given others and myself my word that I would save his life, but because I really couldn't live without him. Unfortunately in erasing his doubt, I gave him the weapon he needed to break me. As I had so many times before, I had fallen right into his trap. I definitely wasn't as smart as I had once thought that I was.

Snow hadn't been telling me to show my undoubted love for Cato to try and quell the rebellion. He must have already known that it was coming. He had known that there was nothing left to do. No fighting or propaganda on either side would have stopped it at that point. It all meant that Snow had been doing it to try and find my one great weakness. He really had needed to know how much I had loved him, and I had stupidly given it to him.

Finnick and I sat for a long time in silence, watching the knots bloom and vanish, before I could ask, "How do you bear it?"

Finnick looked at me in disbelief. "I don't, Aspen! Obviously, I don't. I drag myself out of nightmares each morning and find there's no relief in waking." Something in my expression stopped him. "Better not to give in to it. It takes ten times as long to put yourself back together as it does to fall apart."

Well, he must know. When I had first met Finnick, I would have never thought that he even had the potential to be weak. He was always smiling and always had some type of teasing grin in his voice. Silky and seductive. Who would have thought that underneath was a man even more broken than I was? Who would have known that one day I would know just how he felt, for the exact same reason? I took a deep breath, forcing myself back into one piece.

Even now, the pieces threatened to crumble all over again. They were wavering, barely holding themselves together. It was like I had spent the past few months falling apart over and over again. I managed to fall apart each time within seconds, faster and faster each time. It never seemed to stop. It was like each time I tried to put a piece of myself back together, it was like another five broke off. It was a miracle that I wasn't already ashes.

"The more you can distract yourself, the better," Finnick says.

"Yeah," I mumbled.

"First thing tomorrow, we'll get you your own rope. Until then, take mine," Finnick said, handing me over the rope.

"Thanks." I took the rope and ran my hands over the blood stains. "You alright here?"

"I'll live, Aspen," Finnick said, giving me a pointed look.

It was my warning. We weren't dead yet. And we weren't dead for a reason. "You know where we are if you don't want to be alone," I said, laying a hand on his knee.

"Come by whenever," Finnick said dismissively.

Like me, he didn't want the pity. He wanted to wallow in his misery by himself. Once I got back to our area, I spent the rest of the night on my mattress obsessively making knots, holding them up for Buttercup's inspection. If one looked suspicious, he swiped it out of the air and bit it a few times to make sure that it was dead. Katniss woke up for a while to watch, looking very close to questioning me, but one look at my tired eyes silenced her. By morning, my fingers were sore, but I was still holding on.

For most of the following day, I simply laid on my mattress. My fingers were slowly easily remembering the noose that Finnick had once showed me. An almost happy memory. I could tell that my silence and noose-making was unsettling Katniss and Prim, but they didn't question me on it. They merely let me do what I wanted to. At midday Seneca arrived at my side and seated himself at my hip, his gaze latched on the newly-minted noose.

"It's better than your last attempt," Seneca said.

Obviously he was referencing the noose that I had put one of the training dummies in for my private training in the Quell. "You remember that, huh?" I asked tonelessly.

"Hard to forget," Seneca said. We sat in silence for a little while before Seneca reached over and pulled the rope away from me. I stared at him for a moment and sat up. "How are you, Aspen?"

Splitting at the seams. "Seems like every day I'm getting closer and closer to falling apart at the seams. Turning to ashes," I whispered.

"You're not dead yet. We're not dead yet. Remember that," Seneca said.

"Not yet," I said.

"It's all going to be alright, Aspen," Seneca promised.

Being alright was completely out of the question. "Will we be out of here soon?" I finally asked.

Seneca gave me a long stare. Getting out of here would definitely make me at least the slightest bit happier. "Once the bombs completely abate," Seneca explained. "We think that they're trying to keep you off of the airwaves for a little while. We've caused some big problems for them recently."

"That's what I figured," I said. "Is everyone calming down?"

People seemed the happiest during Crazy Cat, otherwise they seemed stir crazy, just like I was. "They're starting to figure out that we're safe down here. It's already been almost a day since the last bombs fell. We should be ready to head back above-ground soon," Seneca explained.

"Should we be worried about a new attack?" I questioned.

Seneca shook his head. "Doubtful. They'll likely be trying to send us a message and it's been received. We aren't safe."

Change the subject, Aspen. You can't listen to this anymore. "Ready to tell me the secret?" I said suddenly.

Seneca gave me a fond smile. "Perhaps when you're feeling a little bit stronger."

"So I'll never find out that secret, then?" I said.

"You will." Was the secret even something that I wanted to know? Probably not. "You're going to beat this, Aspen. I genuinely believe that," Seneca said reassuringly.

"How are you?" I asked curiously.

We spent so much time worrying about me that I rarely asked him how he was. "I'm fine," Seneca said flippantly. "How's the rest of your family?"

"They're fine," I said carelessly. "Katniss spends most of her day thinking about how much she hates Buttercup while Prim takes care of him." Seneca smiled. "My mother has been over at the hospital for most of the time. Alana's been having Damien keep her mind off of everything but that seems to be all that Dean wants to think about. Carrie's taking care of Marley. Skye and Julie seem really out of it. Aidan's been a lot friendlier lately."

Seneca raised a brow curiously. "That's the first time that I've heard you call Cato's family your own," he pointed out.

Was it really? I guessed that, for so long, they had just been Cato's family. "I think it's time that I finally realize that they are my family, even if it's just through marriage. After all, they've always treated me like family," I said.

"They care very deeply for you."

"The feelings are reciprocated." A brief silence passed before I looked over at Seneca in irritation. "Will you please tell me what the truth is?" I snapped.

"It's not my truth to tell, Aspen," Seneca said regretfully.

"Will Haymitch tell me?" I asked.

"When the time is right."

How was that a good answer? I just wanted to know what the secret was that they were hiding from me, which evidently had something to do with me. The two of us sat in silence for a little while as I glared at the floor. Eventually Seneca reached over and brushed the hair back off of my forehead to press a soft kiss against my temple. It was something that Gale and Cato used to do all the time. A gesture of love and comfort. At that moment, something finally dawned on me.

"Can I ask you something?" I said.

"Of course."

"Do you ever miss your family?"

"No," Seneca said without hesitation.

"No?" I repeated.

"No. You know why," Seneca said. But I wasn't completely sure. "I lost my mother, the only family member that I ever really cared about, just before your Games. I lost my father years ago, but he was barely family. No siblings. My grandparents were hardly ever around. I'm sure that they're gone, but it doesn't make a difference to me. My family, they're right here."

"And who is?"

"Do you honestly need to ask?" Seneca asked.

Of course I didn't. I knew who his family was. Me; despite everything, we were each other's family. Just as Haymitch and Finnick were also mine. "No. I'm sorry," I said awkwardly, laying a hand on his knee. "I'm glad that you're here."

"As am I," Seneca said, placing a hand over mine. "That was a lovely song that you sang the other day."

"Thanks. They helped me write it," I said, motioning over to the Hadley's.

"It seemed to express your feelings about everything perfectly," Seneca said.

"Yes, that's what I thought."

"Can I tell you a secret?"

"Sure."

Seneca leaned into me and dropped his voice low enough so that no one else could hear us. "I think that they'll be going to get Cato shortly after we're allowed out of the bunker," he whispered.

My heart dropped in a strangely good way. "Really?"

"Yes." My heart was now beating so hard against my ribs that it was almost painful. "Cato bought us eight extra minutes of time with his warning, with no thought as to what it would cost him. That saved the life of everyone in District 13. No one died because of his warning. That won't be something easily forgotten," Seneca pointed out.

"Because you won't let it be forgotten," I said slowly.

Of course. Seneca had always said that he would fight to get Cato back as hard as he could. "Yes," Seneca said.

"Oh..." I jumped forward almost into his lap. "Thank you, Seneca!"

"Absolutely, Aspen," Seneca said softly.

A long while passed that the two of us remained locked together in a tight hug. My laughter was so loud that it was almost hysterical. Many people were watching us curiously, as I rarely showed happiness like this. Seneca's hand rested on the back of my head as I kept mine in his shoulder. I didn't say anything, I merely gave a slight dry heave, my breath catching in my throat. We remained locked together for what felt like years before we finally pulled apart.

"Repeat that information to no one, you understand?" Seneca whispered in my ear.

"Yes," I said.

The two of us finally pulled apart, where it was almost impossible to wipe the smile off of my face. "You should get some rest. I'm expecting that we'll be out of here within the next few hours," Seneca said.

"Okay. I'll see you soon," I said.

"You will," Seneca agreed.

It felt like someone had lifted an anvil off of my chest. For the first time in forever, I felt like I might have a chance at happiness again. So I laid back in the bed with my rope sitting off on the dresser and fell back asleep. As usual, I dreamed of Cato. Tonight I dreamed about the night after Cato proposed to me. But this time I dreamed about everything that we could have been planning. A family, our home, our entire life together. When I woke up a few hours later, I was happy for the first time.

With twenty-four hours of quiet behind us, Coin finally announced that we could leave the bunker. I practically skipped out of the underground prison. Katniss looked about ready to sprint back to the ruins of Twelve. As we made a move to head back to the upper levels we were informed that our old quarters had been destroyed by the bombings. Everyone must follow exact directions to their new compartments. We cleaned our spaces, as directed, and filed obediently toward the door.

It was a good thing that Gale had managed to steal everything from our compartment. I had a good feeling that everything up there had been destroyed during the bombing. But I had the picture of Cato and I in the cave after the fire, his portrait of me from the night on the roof, our wedding rings, and my beloved pearl from the arena. Before I was halfway to the door to see what had become of our old homes, Boggs appeared at my side and pulled me from the line.

"Come with me," he ordered.

"Okay," I said.

He signaled for Gale, Dean, Skye, Julie, Katniss, and Finnick to join us. People moved aside to let us by. Some even smiled at me since the Crazy Cat game seemed to have made me more lovable. Which was definitely something that I needed, since it seemed that everyone hated me beforehand. We went out the door, up the stairs, down the hall to one of those multi directional elevators, and finally we arrived at Special Defense. Nothing along our route had been damaged, but we were still very deep.

The compartments were likely the ones that had genuinely been destroyed. Boggs ushered us into a room virtually identical to Command. Coin, Plutarch, Haymitch, Seneca, Brutus, Cressida, and everybody else around the table looked exhausted. Someone had finally broken out the coffee - although I was sure that it was viewed only as an emergency stimulant - and Plutarch had both hands wrapped tightly around his cup as if at any moment it might be taken away. Coin quickly made her way to my side.

"We took their best shot, didn't we?" Coin offered.

"Yeah," I said. Although I was sure that they could have dropped something far more powerful on us. They weren't going for the kill, just to disable us. "It wasn't for a lack of effort."

"Your mother and sisters okay?" Coin asked.

"Yeah, they're fine. Glad that it's over," I said, motioning over to Katniss.

She looked as if she couldn't get enough air into her system. "As are we. You should know something," Coin said, dropping her voice to a severe whisper. I nodded for her to continue. "We had eight extra minutes of civilian evacuation because of Cato's warning. I won't forget that."

"Thank you," I said, trying to beat back a smile.

Was Seneca telling the truth? Would there finally be a rescue? As we all took our seats, there was no small talk. "We need all four of you suited up and above ground," Coin said to Gale, Finnick, Katniss, and I. "You have two hours to get footage showing the damage from the bombing, establish that Thirteen's military unit remains not only functional but dominant, and, most important, that the Mockingjay is still alive. Any questions?"

"Can we have a coffee?" Finnick asked.

The slightest smile quirked on the edges of my lips. As we all sat around the table, trying to get used to being out of the bunker, steaming cups were handed out. Katniss took a sip and nearly spat the drink back out. It was her first time having it. I stared distastefully at the shiny black liquid, never having been much of a fan of the stuff after I had tried it before my first Games, but thinking that it might help me stay on my feet. Finnick sloshed some cream in my cup and reached into the sugar bowl.

"Want a sugar cube?" Finnick asked in his old seductive voice.

When I had first met Finnick, he had showed me his slightly more vulnerable side. But when it came to the two of us in public, he had always shown me his more flirtatious side. That was how we officially met, at least in the public eye, with Finnick offering me sugar. Surrounded by horses and chariots, costumed and painted for the crowds, before we were officially allies. Before I had any idea of what really made him tick. The memory actually coaxed a rare smile out of me.

"Here, it improves the taste," Finnick said in his real voice, plunking three cubes in my cup.

"Thanks," I said.

Instantly the coffee faded into a soft brown rather than the pitch black that it was before. For a long time I merely stared at it and when I finally drank from the cup, it seared painfully down my throat. As I turned to go suit up as the Mockingjay, I caught Gale watching me and Finnick unhappily. What could it have possibly been now? Did he actually think that something was going on between us? I thought that he knew that Finnick would only ever love Annie.

Maybe he saw me go to Finnick's last night. I would have passed the Hawthorne's space to get there. I guessed that probably rubbed him the wrong way. Me seeking out Finnick's company instead of his. Well, fine. I hadn't really sought his comfort lately anyways. We were too tense. Besides, I had rope burn on my fingers, I could barely hold my eyes open, and a camera crew was waiting for me to do something brilliant. And Snow had Cato. Gale was more than welcome to think whatever he wanted.

In fact, the two of us hadn't spoken since we had arrived down in the bunker. Not since Gale had helped rescue Aidan and Prim from getting trapped outside. Not since that awkward stare that the two of us had shared. Not since that sudden kiss that the two of us had exchanged back in Twelve, in the kitchen of my old home, where my feelings had gotten scrambled all over again. It was a mistake in every sense of the world, but I couldn't take it back.

Since we had arrived down in the bunker, the two of us had only exchanged a few glances with each other. Just like always, we were looking out for each other. We didn't have to speak. In fact, I didn't think that either one of us wanted to speak to each other. Not now and not until we solved whatever it was that was going on between us. In the meantime, we remained in limbo with our friendship. After all, there was nothing to say between us.

In my new Remake Room in Special Defense, my Prep Team slapped me into my Mockingjay suit, arranged my hair back into its standard braid, and applied minimal makeup before my coffee had even cooled. In ten minutes, the cast and crew of the next propos were making the circuitous trek to the outside. They were obviously quite eager to interrupt whatever was on the Capitol airwaves and prove that we were still around and just as determined as always.

As everyone chatted back and forth about what was to come from the propo, I slurped my coffee, mostly ignoring everyone else as we traveled, finding that the cream and sugar greatly enhanced its flavor. Although I still preferred hot chocolate more. Finnick walked alongside me, drinking his own coffee, which I was sure had more sugar in it than coffee. As I knocked back the dregs that had settled to the bottom of the cup, I felt a slight buzz start to run through my veins.

It was more alive than I had felt in a long while. Perhaps that wasn't a good thing. I found that it was making me a little on the neurotic side. As we all headed upstairs, out of the lower levels of District 13, Katniss, Dean, Skye, and Julie officially joined our party. I noticed that Julie was still limping on her ankle. But she, Skye, and Dean looked a little more alive than they had since going down into the bunker. Nearing the top levels, even Brutus joined our gang. As usual, he would likely stay off camera.

After climbing a final ladder out of Thirteen, Boggs hit a lever that opened a trapdoor to let us emerge into the woods. Fresh air rushed into the cold metal walls. I took big gulps and for the first time allowed myself to feel how much I hated the bunker. It felt so familiar being back in the woods. It felt like things might have finally been ready to return to normal. We emerged into the woods, and my hands ran through the leaves overhead. Some were just starting to turn.

"What day is it?" I asked no one in particular.

Boggs told me that September began next week. September. My head snapped upright. It couldn't already be that late in the year. That meant that Snow would have had Cato in his clutches for five, maybe six weeks. Depending on what the exact day was. What could be done to someone in a month and a half? I examined a leaf on my palm and saw that I was shaking. I couldn't will myself to stop. I blamed the coffee and tried to focus on slowing my breathing, which was far too rapid for my pace.

"Don't think about it," Dean said suddenly.

He was at my side and clearly knew what I was thinking. "Five to six weeks of them doing -" I began weakly.

"Stop," Katniss said gently, coming up to my other side. She looked like she was going to latch onto a tree and refuse to ever let go. She clearly didn't want to be back in Thirteen. "Don't think about it. Just say the line and then we're done."

Back in Thirteen we had to use flashlights just to see where we were going. Out here the sun was almost blinding. It seemed teasing, considering everything that we were surrounded by. Debris began to litter the forest floor. We came to our first crater, thirty yards wide and I couldn't tell how deep. Very. Deep enough to have killed someone on the upper floors. Boggs said that anyone on the first ten levels would likely have been killed. We skirted the pit and continue on.

"Can you rebuild it?" Gale asked.

"Not anytime soon. That one didn't get much. A few backup generators and a poultry farm. We'll just seal it off," Boggs said.

"Is the damage worse than we were expecting?" I asked.

"We should have had no warning. The damage is much less than anything that we were expecting," Boggs said.

"That's good," I muttered dumbly.

Perhaps Cato's warning really had done some good. Coin herself had said that it wouldn't be forgotten. Did that mean that she was finally ready to get him back? Plus Seneca had said that he thought that a rescue mission might be getting underway soon. I had a feeling that if there was anyone who was telling me the truth about the plans with Cato, it was him. I tried to read Boggs' expression but, as usual, it was impossible to get any emotion from him.

The trees disappeared as we entered the area inside the fence. The craters were ringed with a mixture of old and new rubble. Before the bombing, very little of the current Thirteen was above ground. A few guard stations. The training area. About a foot of the top floor of our building - where Buttercup's window jutted out - with several feet of steel on top of it. Even that was never meant to withstand more than a superficial attack. It was all warped and burned.

"How much of an edge did the boy's warning give you?" Haymitch asked.

"About ten minutes before our own systems would've detected the missiles," Boggs said.

"But it did help, right?" I asked. I couldn't bear it if he said no.

"Absolutely," Boggs replied. A weight lifted off of my chest. "Civilian evacuation was completed. Seconds count when you're under attack. Ten minutes meant lives saved."

Lives saved. That meant every single life in District 13. I wasn't fool enough to believe that no one would have died without his extra warning. There were too many people in Thirteen. We all barely made it down to the bunker with the eight to ten minute warning that we got. Without that, there was a good chance that at least a fourth of the population of District 13 would be dead. Prim, I realized. Aidan with her. And Gale.

All three of them were in the bunker with Katniss and I only a couple of minutes before the first missile hit. That itself had nearly thrown us all off of our feet, even over forty levels below ground. Cato might have saved them. In fact, I knew that he had saved them. Add their names to the list of things that I could never stop owing him for. All of the trouble that I had given him in the first Games was finally coming back to me. And about ten times more.

"It's like Coin said. She won't forget that," Katniss said, coming up to my side.

"But what will she do about it?" I asked softly.

She was silent for a moment. "Guess we'll find out."

As we headed out towards one of the craters, Cressida had the idea to film me in front of the ruins of the old Justice Building, which was something of a joke since the Capitol had been using it as a backdrop for fake news broadcasts for years, to show that the District no longer existed. The very thing that Bonnie and Twill had pointed out to me so long ago. Now, with the recent attacks, the Justice Building sat about ten yards away from the edge of a new crater.

"So Aspen, it's 'Thirteen is alive and well and so am I,'" Effie trilled from behind me. I ignored her, as I usually did. "Aspen? Aspen. Never one to waste it in rehearsal, I know."

She was right about that. I was definitely one of those people who just did things in the moment. As we approached what used to be the grand entrance, Gale pointed out something and the whole party slowed down. Were those explosives out there? I saw something on the ground, but I had no idea what they were. The problem didn't make sense to me at first - the others seemed to understand - and then I saw that the ground was actually strewn with fresh pink and red roses.

Was I seeing them? Had I actually lost my mind for good? I glanced around at the others to see what they were doing. But they had all stopped to stare down at the flowers. For a moment I thought that it was a joke. Maybe it was a cleverly disguised explosive. But the longer that I looked and the closer that everyone else got to them, the more that I realized that they were real. And I instantly knew exactly what it was that they had been dropped for.

"Don't touch them! They're for me!" I yelled.

The others jumped back but still looked confused. The sickeningly sweet smell hit my nose and made my head spin. Any feeling of hope that I had had just seconds before was now gone. I knew what these were for. I knew who they were for and I knew who they were from. My heart began to hammer against my chest painfully. So I didn't imagine it. The rose on my dresser. Before me laid Snow's second delivery. Just much larger than the last one.

Instead of one flower, there were hundreds of them this time. Clearly having been dropped relatively recently. Long-stemmed pink and red beauties, the very flowers that decorated the set where Cato and I performed our post-victory interview. Flowers not meant for one, but for a pair of lovers. My stomach curled as I leaned down and grabbed the stem of one of them and picked it up. Was I really losing it or did they have just the slightest scent of blood lingering on them?

"Why would they drop these?" Gale asked, holding a red one.

"For me," I breathed.

"But why?" Gale asked curiously.

Everyone was staring at me. I explained to the others as best I could. Upon inspection, they appeared to be harmless, if genetically enhanced, flowers. A few dozen roses. Slightly wilted. Most likely dropped after the last bombing. The others seemed unconcerned about the flowers. If nothing else, simply concerned that they might have had some poison lingering on them. But Snow didn't want a clean death. He wanted to watch me suffer after completely unhinging me.

A crew in special suits were brought in to collect them and cart them away. Even the one that I had been holding since first spotting them. I felt pretty certain that they would find nothing extraordinary in them, though. Snow knew who they would come to. Someone he didn't want to kill so easily. No. Snow knew exactly what he was doing to me. It was like having Cinna beaten to a pulp while I watched helplessly from my Tribute tube. Designed to unhinge me.

Like then, I tried to rally and fight back. Cressida and the rest of the team were speaking to me on and off, but I said nothing and they didn't push. But as Cressida got Castor and Pollux into place to have me say my single line, I felt my anxiety building all over again. I was so tired, so wired from the coffee and flowers, and so unable to keep my mind on anything but Cato since I had seen the roses. My hands were shaking and my body felt like it was turning to liquid.

The coffee was definitely a huge mistake. What I didn't need was a stimulant. My body visibly shook and I couldn't seem to catch my breath. It was like I had just run through the arena. After days in the bunker, I was squinting no matter what direction I turned towards, and the light hurt my eyes. Even in the cool breeze, sweat trickled down my face. It felt like it did when I was weaning myself off of the numbing medication after the Quell.

"So, what exactly do you need from me again?" I asked as confidently as I could.

The others were staring at me, wondering if I was alright, but I tried to push past them. "Just a few quick lines that show you're alive and still fighting," Cressida said.

"Okay," I said.

As the rest of the team started taking their own spots, I glanced around. Skye was holding Julie up, but their gazes were down on the flowers. Gale was staring at them but clearly didn't see their significance. Katniss was staring at them with a severe glance - so were Haymitch and Brutus. Of course they would understand what the flowers meant. They had been in the Capitol and had been exposed to Snow long enough to know what his messages meant.

Cressida and the rest of her team were completely focused on the upcoming propo. Boggs was watching me closely. I could see that the camera crew was ready, but I wasn't. My thoughts were still on the flowers. On Cato. On Snow. What were they doing to him? Was he already dead? Were they planning on it soon? Would it happen without warning? Would he put it on camera and show it to me? How much longer did I have before he was dead?

More than once Cressida gave me a little nod to get me to move. Where was I supposed to go? It took Gale and Katniss to lead me down to where I was supposed to stand. Once I had finally taken my position, I stood there blankly. What was I supposed to say? Was Cato even capable of speech at the moment? Cressida nodded for me to speak again. My thoughts were still completely encompassed with Cato and his position. For a long time I was staring into the red light. Staring. Staring.

"I'm sorry, I've got nothing," I finally said.

Cressida walked up to me. "You feeling okay?" she asked. I nodded. She pulled a small cloth from her pocket and blotted the sweat off of my face. "How about we do the old Q-and-A thing?"

"Yeah. That would help, I think," I said.

That was likely the only way that I would manage to speak right now. At least about something that wasn't my fear of what could happen to Cato if we didn't get him out of the Capitol soon. I crossed my arms to hide the shaking. My hands were clammy and the flower faltering in my grip. I glanced at Finnick, who gave me a thumbs-up. But he was looking pretty shaky himself. He was obviously thinking about Annie. At least I had seen Cato. Finnick hadn't seen Annie since the night before the Quell.

Cressida was back in position now. "So, Aspen." I tried to force myself to look alert. "You've survived the Capitol bombing of Thirteen. How did it compare with what you experienced on the ground in Eight?"

"We were so far underground this time, there was no real danger," I said. "Thirteen's alive and well and so am -"

My voice cut off in a dry, squeaking sound. What the hell was the line supposed to be? Yes, I was alive, but Cato might not have been. And I might as well have not been alive. It was like I was just standing here in an empty shell. It was the way that I had been since Cato had been taken at the end of the Quell. I tried to open my mouth and force the line out of my mouth again, but my voice seemed to have been lost the moment after I had seen the flowers.

"Try the line again. 'Thirteen's alive and well and so am I,'" Cressida prompted.

I took a breath, trying to force air down into my diaphragm. "Thirteen's alive and so -"

No, that was wrong. My mouth flapped open and closed a few times as I continued to get the line wrong in my head. Switching District 13 with District 12. Mixing up my words. My voice getting lodged in my throat before I could get to the end of the line. Either way, it wasn't working and I obviously wasn't getting anywhere with this anytime soon. I was too busy thinking about Cato and the flowers. I could swear that I could still smell those roses, even after I had dropped the flower.

"Aspen, just this one line and you're done today. I promise. 'Thirteen's alive and well and so am I,'" Cressida said.

Eight words. That was all that it was. I could manage it. It was easy. It was easier than the interviews that I had given in the Capitol. I swung my arms to loosen myself up. Placed my fists on my hips. Then dropped them to my sides as I felt too stiff. Saliva was filling my mouth at a ridiculous rate and I felt vomit at the back of my throat. I swallowed hard and opened my lips so I could get the stupid line out and go hide in the woods and - that was when I start crying.

Everyone came dashing up to me to see what was happening, completely ignoring the fact that it was supposed to be a closed set. Katniss was the first one at my side, urging Cressida to stop filming. She didn't, waiting to see if I could put myself back together again. But I couldn't. I was so far gone that the splinters of my very being had splinters. A few seconds later, Skye, Julie, and Dean were at my sides. Even Gale looked about ready to come and check on me.

It was impossible for me to be the Mockingjay. Impossible to complete even that one sentence. Because now I know that everything I said would be directly taken out on Cato. Result in his torture. Even more than they had already been doing. It was destined to get worse and worse. But nothing that I did would result in his death, no, nothing as merciful as that. Death was, as I had said, a peaceful end to everything. Snow was bound to ensure that his life was much worse than death.

"Cut," I heard Cressida say quietly.

"What's wrong with her?" Plutarch asked under his breath.

"She's figured out how Snow's using Cato," says Finnick.

There was something like a collective sigh of regret from the semicircle of people spread out before me. But I didn't care that they were upset with me. They could be as upset with me as they wanted. I didn't give a damn how upset they were. I was still upset that they had left Cato in the damned arena. That was what had started the entire problem. In the background I could hear Seneca requesting a meeting with Coin. Boggs muttered something in response.

A meeting would do nothing at this point. It was too late for that. I couldn't do anything. Not at the risk of his own life. Not at the risk of something terrible that he would have happen to himself. Because I knew that now. Because there would never be a way for me to not know that again. Because, beyond the military disadvantage losing a Mockingjay entailed, I was broken. I had been broken for a long time, but this was the final, irreparable, damage. There was no coming back from this.

"He's gonna kill Cato," I breathed.

It wasn't even a question anymore. This was my final warning. Either step down from my role as the Mockingjay, risk a rescue for Cato, or have him killed. There were three options and none of them were any better than the other. If I stepped down from being the Mockingjay, not only would I look like a coward, but it was likely that others would stop fighting. We could end up losing most of our strongest fighters on a rescue mission and there was no guaranteed success.

There was also the issue that we didn't even know where Cato was being held. Then there was the final option. We could go ahead and continue on plans for me to be the Mockingjay, just the way that I knew that Cato would have wanted. But I was sick of that happening. I was sick of doing the things that Cato wanted. He didn't have a vote in this one. I was going to save his life. I had to save his life. He deserved it after everything that he had done for me.

But how could I do it? I could barely even motivate myself to get out of bed these days. If Cato died, I wasn't sure that I would ever be able to get past it. I wasn't sure that I would ever be able to motivate myself to move again. I had to be the Mockingjay for the rebellion, but there was something much more important to me than that. Getting Cato back. I needed him. If he died, I couldn't be the reason. Which left me as nothing more than a useless puppet with broken strings.

"Let's try again. Can you speak up? We don't have a mic on you," Cressida said. We didn't need a mic. I needed my fucking husband back. "'Thirteen is alive and well and so am I.'"

"He's gonna kill Cato," I mumbled, gasping for air. It felt like my throat had suddenly closed itself off. "I can't."

"Aspen?" Cressida asked softly.

"You can do it, Aspen," Gale said.

No... I would never be able to do this. Not if it meant that there was a chance that Cato could die. I knew that he would be dead soon enough. But if I said something right now, it meant that he would be dead that much sooner. There was no chance that we could even plan a rescue mission. We had very little time left to solve this. My hands were shaking weakly and my knees threatened to cave in as I tried to figure out where Seneca was. I needed his help. He had to help me.

"Aspen, are you okay?" Katniss asked, walking over to me.

"I can't do this," I said weakly.

Tears were starting to build in my eyes. "'Thirteen is alive and well and so am I,'" Cressida repeated.

Honestly I was so far from well that it wasn't even funny. I was never going to be okay. Not without him. Not with the knowledge that my smallest move would result in his death. Snow knew that he was holding me by a thread. He knew that I would catch onto what he was hinting at with the flowers. He knew that this was his final way to control me. Could I really save Cato? Was I already too late? Was he already dead? Was there any way to stop him? My breath was coming in short gasps by now.

"He's just gonna keep..." I gasped. He's already dead. Look at what you did to him. He can't and won't ever have a normal life and it's all because of you. "He's never gonna stop."

The others clearly had no idea what I was getting at. "Aspen," Cressida said gently.

But she didn't say anything else. She clearly understood that I wasn't okay. She must have realized that I couldn't keep going like this. I was already falling apart before, but now I was shattered. Several sets of arms moved to embrace me. But in the end, the only person I truly wanted to comfort me was Haymitch, because he loved Cato, too. In his own way, at least. He probably loved him more than he loved me. He was certainly easier to get along with.

Not long afterwards, Dean, Skye, Julie, and even Brutus joined the fray. Dean's hand was on my lower back. Skye and Julie both seemed to be having a hard time keeping themselves together. Even Brutus was shaking. Cato was like part of his family. It must have hurt, now that he also knew what was happening. We all knew. The question was just how we could get him back. I reached out for Haymitch and said something like his name and suddenly he was there, holding me and patting my back.

"It's okay. It'll be okay, sweetheart," Haymitch whispered.

His arms were locked tight around my waist as I pressed my face into his shoulder. Tears were flowing down my face as Haymitch tried to help me regain control of my breathing. But it wasn't working. It was almost impossible to suck air back into my lungs. The others were muttering back and forth among themselves, but I was focused on keeping myself together until Cato was back. Haymitch pulled me along and sat me on a length of broken marble pillar, keeping an arm around me while I sobbed.

"I can't do this anymore," I said breathlessly.

"I know," Haymitch said.

"All I can think of is - what he's going to do to Cato - because I'm the Mockingjay!" I just barely managed to get out.

"I know." Haymitch's arm tightened around me.

"Did you see? How weird he acted?" I gasped. Haymitch gave a slow nod. I recognized the tightening of his arm. It had always been his way to warn me to keep calm and relax. But I couldn't right now. "What are they - doing to him?"

"Cressida, we should cut the cameras," Effie called from on top of the crater.

"As long as I'm the Mockingjay," I mumbled, my voice catching in my throat.

This wouldn't end until I hung up the Mockingjay costume. Maybe it wouldn't end even then. But at least Cato would have a quicker death if I hung up my sign as the Mockingjay. What could I do to save him? What was there to do that hadn't already been done? My breaths were coming in ragged gasps as I tried to keep myself from shattering into a million pieces right there. I tried to force Seneca's name from my throat, beg him to come and fix this, but the hysteria in me was taking over.

"It's okay, Aspen," Haymitch whispered in my ear.

"You just have to calm down," Katniss added, walking up to me.

There was no way that I could calm down. Not after this. "No, he warned me," I said, slipping down into practical psychosis. "He warned me about this." I pushed my way out of Haymitch's arms, trying to remind myself to breathe. "He's doing this because I'm the Mockingjay. He's punishing Cato to punish me. No. No, I can't do this."

"Aspen," Cressida called.

"Don't make me do this!" I shouted.

Each word had a long enunciation on it. They couldn't make me do this. They didn't understand what was going to happen if they made me go through with this. They didn't understand everything that I would lose if Cato died. They didn't understand what would happen to me if he died. They would permanently lose their Mockingjay. I began wandering the crater, debating on where I could run. Nowhere. There was nowhere left for me to hide.

"Let her go," Boggs said.

It looked like Cressida and the others were going to try and get me to stay where I was. But I couldn't. My breath was coming in short gasps as I tried to figure out where to go. Not into the woods. I wasn't allowed to be out there right now. Not back into Thirteen. I had already been in there for too long. I just wanted to leave here. So I darted to the far side of the set where Effie gave me her hand to help me up onto the top of the crater. I staggered over the rubble as I marched up the hill.

"I gotta get out of here," I gasped.

"Aspen, hang on, you're okay," Dean said, trying to pull me back to them.

"Come back!" Julie yelled after me.

"I got her," Brutus said.

A moment later a few people were trying to grab me. I could feel their arms on my shoulders and back, trying to bring me back to them. But I couldn't. I was going to lose it. I needed to get out of here. I tried to fight back against them, but there were too many of them. Even as Brutus yanked me into him, trying to keep a tight grip on me to prevent me from hurting myself. I was gasping for air between sobs, trying to ask them to let go of me, but I only managed to get out one last phrase.

"It's my fault!" I shouted.

It was the same thing that had happened to me after the first Games. It was the same sense of hysteria, unable to tell the difference between what was happening in real life and what I was imagining. Was he already dead? Could I save him? Could I save myself? And then I lost all sense of reality and crossed some line into hysteria. After a few seconds of screaming and flailing there was a needle in my arm and the world slipped away.

Cato's P.O.V.

His head was throbbing with a dull pain as he walked down the hallway towards President Snow's study. He wasn't expecting to have a meeting today. Not that he ever really expected a meeting. He normally just sat where he was until someone called him to do something. He certainly hadn't expected anyone to want to talk to him today. They hadn't spoken to him since the day that he had given his interview. He had done and said what they'd wanted him to do. What more could they possibly have wanted?

It felt like he was walking on a high-wire. It felt like he was going to fall to one side or the other at any moment. Maybe back on the side of normalcy. The way that he had felt since going into the first Games. Being with Aspen. Knowing who she was. The love of his life. The woman that he would have done absolutely anything for. The woman that he would have died for. He would have always fought for her, taking any beating for her, and happily ended his own life for.

On the other side of the line was something completely different. The monster that she might have actually been the entire time. The one who was in love with Seneca Crane and had used Cato as a puppet the entire time. The one who had killed his sister because of her act in the Quell. The muttation that the Capitol had designed to string Cato along. He was so in love with her the way that he had never been in love with anyone before... maybe it was all synthetic.

He couldn't figure it out. His hands twitched every time that he saw her. The slight desperation to be with her. To pull her into him with a crushing force and never let go of her. But there was something else that was finally starting to take over him. The desperation to place his fingers around her throat and tighten it until he felt her vocal chords break. Watch her face turn purple from lack of breath. Eventually feel her heartbeat slow until it was down to nothing. Watch her die.

The one thing that he had once fought so hard to, to keep her alive, was now the thing that he wanted the most from her. It would end the constant eternal fighting in his head and heart. Cato staggered down the hallway, his fingers twitching and eyes barely able to keep themselves open. The two Peacekeepers standing at his sides were walking him down towards the large wooden doors. Cato stopped in front of them and knocked, waiting for the affirmative to walk in.

Once he had, President Snow glanced up from his desk. "My boy. Sit, please," President Snow said, motioning to the chair on the other side of his desk.

"Sir," Cato greeted.

"Thank you for your wonderful interview the other day," President Snow said.

"You're welcome," Cato said suspiciously. He had been beaten to a near bloody pulp after the interview. "You didn't seem too pleased near the end."

He could remember the look on President Snow's face after the interview. He was sure that he had never seen the president so angry. The moment that the cameras were off, Cato had been brought back to the old cell where he had been when he had first arrived in the Capitol after the Quell. He had been hung by chains against the wall, all day being reminded of what happened if he tried to warn Aspen of the Capitol's plans against Thirteen.

Cato had just barely seen himself in the mirror after what they had done to him. Whips against his chest and legs. Fists and brass knuckles against his face and stomach. Bruises kept his eyes sunken deep into his head. His hair seemed to be falling out from a lack of food and sleep the past few days. His ribs, hips, and collarbone were plainly visible, even more so than after the first Games. His cheeks were hollowed out and his face was splotchy. Those were just the physical problems.

"We understand, Cato, how hard it is to recognize the simple fact that Aspen Antaeus is not the woman that she originally presented herself to you as," President Snow finally said.

Cato twitched in the chair slightly. Aspen... There was a strange tugging sensation behind his chest. Did he want her? Did he want to kill her? Who was she? Who was his wife? A monster - that was who. He had seen that much. She was the monster who had destroyed the world. She destroyed the Games. He had been so close to being the Victor that he had always wanted to be - he could have had everything in the world that he wanted - and then she had destroyed everything. Hadn't she?

But a string of memories followed his thoughts. All of those little moments that had happened over the past year and a half. All of the moments where he remembered desperately wanting her. In every single way. He had wanted her to be his wife. He had wanted to share his entire life with her. Everything from showing her his favorite spots, to living and building a life together, to eventually even having a family. Learning that there was more to life than the Games. Was that girl really a monster?

"You're nothing like I thought you would be. Just so you know."

A genuinely scrutinizing stare. Not loving; confused. A brush of a kiss against a cheek.

"Will you stay with me? Until the end?"

She had just played him. He knew that now.

"I hate you."

A nest of Tracker Jackers. A genuine attempt to kill him. An attempt to go back on it after it hadn't worked.

"If you die, I won't know how to move on."

Tears building in her eyes. Her voice cracking painfully.

"I need you."

An unwillingness to move on from him.

"I do. I need you."

The words so genuine that it surprised him.

Was she really that good of an actress? Were all of her words a lie? There were more than those. He vaguely remembered them. But he also remembered everything that she had said. All of those terrible things that she had done. Everything from killing Leah to starting the rebellion. Pretending to love Cato while she was truly in love with Seneca Crane. But she was a muttation. She wasn't the love of his life that he had originally thought that she was.

He didn't understand how the entire thing had become this complicated. He was infuriated with how confused his feelings were for her. Had she maybe meant some of the things that she had said to him? That could have happened. Maybe there was the slightest chance that, at some point, it could have been possible that she had felt just the slightest bit of love for him. Or was that wishful thinking on his part? Did she really hate him as much as she had made it out to be?

"You won the Games, Cato," President Snow said, breaking Cato from his thoughts. "You should be very proud of yourself. You've been every bit the successful Victor that we wanted you to be."

"Aspen -"

"Played you for a fool, I fear," President Snow interrupted Cato immediately. Yes, I suppose that she did. "Her heart always laid with Seneca Crane." Cato gave a slight twitch. "It's unfortunate that we couldn't have caught it sooner. Perhaps we would have been able to show her true personality far sooner than we did."

A simple District 12 girl who had turned his entire life into a nightmare. A simple District 12 girl whom he had fallen in love with. A simple District 12 girl who had turned out to be a complete lie. He remembered what had happened just before he had given his interview. President Snow had warned Cato that they were sending bombers out to District 13 to try and level it. At least, some of the top bunks. Was she in there, or was she further down for more protection?

"Is she dead?" Cato finally asked, unsure if he wanted the answer.

Or which answer he wanted to hear. President Snow shook his head. "We doubt it. Your unfortunate warning likely bought her and the rest of District 13 enough time to evacuate themselves and limit casualties," he said.

"I'm sorry," Cato said automatically.

"It's alright, my boy. Love is a powerful thing to override," President Snow said charmingly.

"I don't love her," Cato snapped back.

His stomach was curling in knots as he shifted slightly in his seat again. He didn't love her. He couldn't love her. Not after everything that she had done to him. Not after she had turned his life into a living nightmare. Everything had been destroyed by her. She had murdered his sister. She had brought the surviving members of his family to the very place that President Snow had just ordered be dismantled. She was the reason that he had faced the torture that he had in the Capitol.

Yet... There was no yet... He hated her... "Of course you don't," President Snow said, smiling his familiarly cold smile. "She killed your sister."

Cato gave another slight twitch in his chair. Aspen had killed his sister. His little baby sister, whom he had always sworn that he would protect. Aspen, who had once been the love of his life, had killed one of the most important person in his. He couldn't believe what she had done to him. The way that she had turned his life completely on its head. She had destroyed everything of his, even though he had thought that he had given her everything that he had.

"Do you still love her?" President Snow asked after a brief silence.

"No," Cato said quickly.

"That's good. Because she doesn't love you. She never has," President Snow said.

He repeated the words in his head at least ten times. She doesn't love you. She doesn't love you. She never did. She killed your family. She tried to kill you. She used you. She's just a better actress than she ever let on. But something about the entire thing really bothered him. Cato didn't want to believe that she had never really loved him. He wanted to think that she did actually love him at some point. Even just the slightest bit. There was no way that it had all been a lie.

What the hell are you thinking? That's the girl that killed your little sister. It was the constant back and forth that was plaguing him. The never-ending battle between what was real and what was fake. He could see all of the things that she had done to try and hurt him, but there were other things too. Little whispers of what might have also happened. Midnight talks about their love for each other. Soft kisses, promises of the future, and words that were so much more than words. They were the truth.

"In case you doubt it." President Snow clicked his fingers and the door behind them opened. A moment later a Peacekeeper entered the room, carrying a small file. He handed it over to President Snow. "Why don't you take a look?" President Snow offered, handing over the file to Cato.

Somewhat reluctantly, Cato reached out and grabbed the file from President Snow. The Peacekeeper left just moments later. Once the door had clicked shut, Cato pulled the file open. There were only two pieces of paper in there with many words that Cato didn't understand. Fr the longest time, he was completely unsure of what he was holding the file for. There was nothing that made sense to him. Then words started to jump out to him.

Some of the words were a little fuzzy and it just reminded Cato of all of the pain that he had been through. There was undoubtedly a concussion still settling somewhere in his brain. Cato couldn't understand the words, but finally something actually caught his eyes. A word that made sense. Both the printed words and the note that was written from someone whose name Cato didn't recognize underneath it. His heart started hammering in his chest.

"Is this true?" Cato asked breathlessly, looking up at President Snow.

He tried to read the president's face, but it was a stony mask. "Yes," President Snow said. Cato's heart dropped into his stomach. "Do you see the heartless creature whom you thought loved you for what she really is?"

"Th - this can't be real," Cato stuttered.

President Snow nodded regretfully. "Oh, I am afraid that it is. I believe that you can confirm at least part of it." Cato nodded blankly. "Just in case you ever doubt that we're doing the right thing. We're trying to protect you from her. You have seen firsthand how everything that she touches turns to ash. This included."

Cato's entire body was shaking in fury. How could that have been real? How could she have done that? He tried to think of ways that it could be a lie, but it wasn't. He knew that President Snow wasn't lying. The entire time, he had never been lying. He was trying to protect Cato from the monster that he had been forced to marry. How could such a pretty young woman - whilst not in her muttation form - be even crueler than he had thought that she could be?

His thoughts were going at a thousand miles a minute as he tried to figure out something to say to President Snow. Whether he should thank him for finally telling the truth or go on a rampage. He was too weak for either one of those choices, so he merely dropped back into the chair weakly, panting slightly, unable to believe the truth. He just knew one thing. The second that he found Aspen, whenever that moment might have been, he wouldn't hesitate. He would kill her.

"Please bring Mr. Hadley to one of our upper-level rooms," President Snow ordered after a long silence.

"Yes, sir," the Peacekeeper in the corner of the room said.

An upper-level room. Was he finally being taken out of his torture chamber? "I just thought that it was high time that you saw that. Just so you know that Aspen Antaeus deserves none of your love. She never has," President Snow said as Cato stood.

"Yes, sir," Cato said blankly.

He was right about that. Aspen didn't deserve any of his love and as of right now, she had none of it. There was no way that she would ever have any of it ever again. He was going to kill her. Slowly. Painfully. He wouldn't stop until he was sure that she had suffered just a fraction of how much he had. As Cato took a different path towards the upper-level rooms of the Tribute Center he began to fantasize all of the ways that he could finally kill his wife.

Aspen's P.O.V.

It must have been strong, whatever they shot into me, because it was a full day before I came to. My eyes were fuzzy, my back was throbbing, and my throat was closed. It definitely wasn't pleasant, waking up. No more pleasant than it had been any time that I had woken up in the past few months. My sleep wasn't peaceful, even with the drug. I had the sense of emerging from a world of dark, haunted places where I traveled alone.

My head was spinning around on my shoulders for a little while. What the hell had happened? The lights were blazing into my eyes as I tried to remember where I was and what had happened that had caused them to put me to sleep. Again. How many times was it now? I glanced over and realized that Haymitch sat in the chair by my bed, his skin waxen with his eyes bloodshot. Why? Then I remembered about Cato and the flowers and started to tremble again.

Haymitch reached out and squeezed my shoulder. "It's all right," Haymitch said. For a beat, he dropped the nice act. "So this is the end, huh? I suppose you're just gonna hide down here forever?"

"I can't be the Mockingjay," I gasped.

"Not the Mockingjay, just Aspen," Haymitch said, patting me on the shoulder again. "You know, you're the only real friend I have down here." My gaze stayed aimed towards the ground. "I don't suppose they gave you any kind of medication?"

Of course. Haymitch could never be too nice. "You're unbelievable," I scoffed.

"Okay, but I meant what I said. I... Look, the reason that I'm here..." Haymitch's voice wasn't confident, something that I rarely heard from him. Something was wrong. "We're going to try to get Cato out," he finally spit out.

My head snapped up. "What?"

They were going to try and get Cato out... All of the words made perfect sense. They were all words that I knew and used in my everyday life. But when strung together, made no sense. They were going to get Cato out... How were they going to do that? What did it mean? The entire thing made no sense. My head was spinning as I stared at Haymitch. What the hell was he talking about? Haymitch gave me a few seconds to process the new information, but I could have had a lifetime and still not understood.

"The dam went down in District 7, took out most of the power to the Capitol, knocked out their signal defense. Beetee's inside their system now wreaking all kinds of havoc. A window is open to us. How much longer? I don't know. I guess until the Capitol can get the power back on," Haymitch explained.

Too much information all at once, but only one thought stood out. I'm going to have him back. "And President Coin?" I asked curiously.

"You know, I can never fully support that woman in light of the prohibition they have going on around this place, but Plutarch got word that Cato and the others are in the Tribute Center. And with the power out, Coin sees this as an opportunity. She knows that Cato is the Capitol's weapon, the same way you're ours. And as opposed to having you two pointing at each other, she's going to get him," Haymitch said.

They were going to get him back. Cato would be back here soon enough. He would be back... He would see his family again... His family would get to see him again... I would get to see him again... We could end the rebellion together, end the Games once and for all, and finally get our happily ever after. We could get to have a real life together. A wicked smile broke over my face - the first real one in a long time - as I tried to jump out of the bed.

"I have to go help," I breathed.

"Hey, hey, whoa, kiddo. Wait, wait, wait. Come on, what are you gonna do? Jump out of the hospital and storm the Capitol? Sit back for a little while. Just relax," Haymitch said, pushing me back down into the bed.

Trying to relax slightly and just enjoy the fact that Cato would be back with me soon enough, I nodded and tried to gather my thoughts. "So what's happening?" I asked breathlessly.

"Plutarch's sending in a rescue team. He has people on the inside. He thinks we can get Cato back alive," Haymitch said.

Alive... Alive was the important part. "Why didn't we before?" I asked.

"Because it's costly. But everyone agrees this is the thing to do. It's the same choice we made in the arena. To do whatever it takes to keep you going. We can't lose the Mockingjay now. And you can't perform unless you know Snow can't take it out on Cato," Haymitch explained.

Yes, he was right about that. We couldn't risk losing me as the Mockingjay. That would destroy everything that we had worked towards. The people were fighting because I was still fighting, even after technically losing everything. If I stopped fighting, it meant that they would stop too. With Cato here, I could throw all of my weight behind being the Mockingjay and not worry about what the Capitol would do to him. Haymitch eventually offered me a cup of water.

"Here, drink something," he said.

I slowly sat up and took a sip of water. "What do you mean, costly?" I asked.

Haymitch shrugged. "Covers will be blown. People may die," Haymitch said. A shiver shot up my spine. It's worth it. He's worth it. "But keep in mind that they're dying every day. And it's not just Cato; we're getting Annie out for Finnick, too."

"Where is he?" I asked curiously.

"Behind that screen, sleeping his sedative off. He lost it right after we knocked you out," Haymitch said. I smiled a little, feel a bit less weak. The screen was on the other side of my bed and I nodded. Finnick would be thrilled when he woke up. "Yeah, it was a really excellent shoot. You two cracked up and Boggs left to arrange the mission to get Cato. We're officially in reruns."

Despite everything, I snorted softly. That sounded like something that Boggs would do. He was strange. I wanted to hate him and blame him for me ending up like this, but I couldn't. Because I knew that, on some level, Boggs actually cared what happened to me. I also knew that I needed to go and see Seneca. I knew that he had taken some part in this. He had finally lived up to his promise of saving Cato from the Capitol.

"Well, if Boggs is leading it, that's a plus," I said.

"Oh, he's on top of it. It was volunteer only, but he pretended not to notice me waving my hand in the air," Haymitch said. Volunteer? Who would have volunteered for a mission like that? "See? He's already demonstrated good judgment."

That was when something else dawned on me. It wasn't just the fact that there was an issue with Haymitch wanting to volunteer. He would have never volunteered for a mission like that. Not because he didn't care about Cato or my well-being, but because he was acting strangely cheerful. He wasn't like Effie, constantly happy, no matter the circumstances. Something was wrong. Haymitch was trying a little too hard to cheer me up. It had never really been his style.

"So who else volunteered?" I asked carefully.

"I think there were nine altogether," Haymitch said evasively.

Suddenly I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. "Who else, Haymitch?" I insisted.

"Dean, of course," Haymitch said. Of course. His brother. Made perfect sense. "Wants to go save his brother. Skye is going. Julie wanted to, but her foot still isn't completely healed from everything in Eight."

All perfectly good people. "Who else?" I snapped.

"Katniss tried to volunteer, but they refused. They think that she's too emotionally attached to this one." I nodded again, but I knew that it wasn't what I was looking for. I gave a nasty glare. Haymitch finally dropped the good-natured act. "You know who else, Aspen. You know who stepped up first."

Of course I did. There was only one other person who would have stepped up before me. There was only one person who would do absolutely anything for me, even after we had been fighting for literally over a year, ever since the first Games. My stomach curled in on itself. He didn't hate me. Even if he did, he would have done it anyways. Mostly because, no matter what, we would always be each other's best friend. Yes, I knew exactly who would risk his life to get Cato back for me.

Gale.

Chapter 13: Chapter Thirteen

Today I might lose both of them. The thought repeated itself at least twenty times as I stared at Haymitch. I might lose both of them. What would happen if I lost both of them? How would I ever be able to manage myself without them? My heart was pounding in my chest as I continued staring at Haymitch, waiting for him to tell me that he was just messing with me. But he wasn't. They were really going after Cato. Gale was. And I might end up losing them both.

For a little while I went into a state of deadened panic. My heart was beating erratically but I couldn't bring myself to get the hell out of the bed. Cato... Gale... Both of them, dead. All because of me. What would happen if one or both of them didn't make it out? What if the Capitol found out about the rescue and killed Cato before they could get to him? What if Gale was shot on their way in? My breathing shortened slightly. They both might die today.

There were so many things that could go wrong on a mission to the Capitol. Little things and big things. Things that would change everything for me. I couldn't even count the numerous things that could go wrong on what was sure to be one of the most dangerous missions that they would ever attempt. What if one of them died on the journey to the Capitol? I couldn't even imagine a life where Cato or Gale might be dead, as much as I did fight with them.

Terrified of what hadn't happened yet, but I was sure would, I tried to imagine a world where both Gale's and Cato's voices had ceased. Hands stilled. Eyes unblinking. I was standing over their bodies, having a last look, leaving the room where they laid. Trying to tell myself that the future could still exist without them. But when I opened the door to step out into the world, there was only a tremendous void. A pale gray nothingness that was all my future held.

That was what would happen to me if one or both of them died. Having either one of them die would also kill me. My life would never be the same without either one of them. It couldn't be. It would be like me, myself, had died. Losing either one of them would destroy me, just the way that Snow wanted. My best friend and the love of my life. Both of them - gone. I couldn't imagine it. I stared blankly at Haymitch, who looked just about as concerned as I was.

"Do you want me to have them sedate you until it's over?" Haymitch asked.

He wasn't joking. This was a man who spent his adult life at the bottom of a bottle, trying to anesthetize himself against the Capitol's crimes. The sixteen-year-old boy who won the second Quarter Quell must have had people he loved - family, friends, a sweetheart maybe - that he fought to get back to. Where were they now? Dead; Finnick had told me that. How was it that until Peeta and I were thrust upon him, and later Cato, there was no one at all in his life? What exactly did Snow do to them?

"No. I want to go to the Capitol. I want to be part of the rescue mission," I said determinedly.

"They're gone," Haymitch said.

It was like a punch to the gut. "How long ago did they leave? I could catch up. I could -"

My voice broke off as I tried to figure out what I could possibly do. There was nothing that I could think of. Go to the Capitol and risk them killing me too? Risk the Mockingjay's life. Coin would love that. There was no way that anyone would let me go. I could have possibly snuck onto the hovercraft that would go into the Capitol, but it was already gone. It was too late. The thoughts raced through my head. What? What could I do? Haymitch shook his head.

"It'll never happen," he said.

"I have to -"

"You're too valuable and too vulnerable," Haymitch interrupted. Of course, exactly what I had been expecting. "There was talk of sending you to another District to divert the Capitol's attention while the rescue takes place. But no one felt you could handle it."

"Please, Haymitch!" I was begging now. "I have to do something. I can't just sit here waiting to hear if they died. There must be something I can do!" I shouted hysterically.

Haymitch and I stared at each other for a few moments. "All right. Let me talk to Plutarch," Haymitch finally said. "You stay put."

"No," I gasped, grabbing for his arms. "Haymitch, please, let me go."

"Aspen, just wait," Haymitch said comfortingly.

"I can't! I've been waiting here for weeks!" I screamed.

"One more day won't kill you," Haymitch said.

"Haymitch!"

"All right!" Haymitch finally yelled, fed up with me. He pressed a hand on my shoulder and shoved me back into the bed. "Relax. Sit here and let me see what I can do about having you meet them halfway, at least. Maybe have you on the plane or waiting nearby."

I guessed that would be better than nothing. "Do something, anything, please," I begged.

"Okay. Wait here," Haymitch ordered.

He got back to his feet and walked off. My heart was pounding erratically as I placed my hands on my knees and tucked my head down into them. What could I do? Not just sit here and wait. I had been sitting here and waiting for a month and a half. I had sat here on my ass for way too long. I couldn't just keep doing that. If they were going to get him - which would likely be a near deadly mission - I had to be there. This was one thing that they couldn't keep me out of.

Mine had to be the first familiar face that Cato saw. I wanted mine to be the only one that he saw. Would he even trust the rest of them? What if he was panicked? What if he thought that the entire thing was a lie? What if he thought that it was just his imagination or something that the Capitol came up with? If I was there, I could drag him out with us. Not that the others couldn't - as they would likely be stronger than me - but... What? I had no good reason to be there.

Other than the fact that I just had to be there. I couldn't wait to hear what was happening. Tears were starting to build in my eyes as I thought about what was to come. I had to be there. I had to be the one to save them. The both of them. I couldn't lose them both. I had to be with them, no matter what was about to happen. As the tears threatened to spill over the edge of my lashes, I sniffed softly. There was only one person who would help me right now. Not Haymitch. Someone else.

No more sitting here on my ass. I couldn't. Haymitch's footsteps were still echoing in the outer hall when I practically fell from my bed and fumbled my way through the slit in the dividing curtain. Right there I found Finnick sprawled out on his stomach, his hands twisted in his pillowcase. Although it was cowardly - cruel even - to rouse him from the shadowy, muted drug land to stark reality, I went ahead and did it because I couldn't stand to face this by myself.

It wasn't fair. I knew that. He could have been out until the entire thing was over. He could have gotten the chance to not know what was happening until we had the answer. Whether they were all on their way back or if they were dead. Finnick was very woozy when I first woke him up and he looked very angry that I had bothered bringing him back to the harsh reality of our situation here. But I quickly interrupted him and went straight into the heart of my explanation.

Just like me with Haymitch earlier, Finnick didn't seem to believe my words at first. Either he didn't believe them or he didn't understand them. It took at least three tries to get it through his head. Then he finally began smiling. I couldn't understand what he was smiling about though. This was one of the biggest nightmares that either one of us could have ever experienced. But even as I explained our situation, his initial agitation mysteriously ebbed away.

"Don't you see, Aspen, this will decide things. One way or the other," Finnick said happily.

"Finnick... don't you get it?" I asked, trying not to upset him but also trying to get him to understand the gravity of the situation. "What if -?"

"What if nothing, Aspen," Finnick interrupted. "We're going to get our answer."

"And if it's one that I can't handle?" I asked.

Finnick stared at me for a few moments. "It'll be an answer either way. By the end of the day, they'll either be dead or with us. It's... it's more than we could hope for!" Finnick gasped.

Well, that's a sunny view of our situation. What would that even be like? To finally have my answer? At the end of the day, there would be an end to all of this. Cato would either be back in my life for good - where I would never let him go - or he would be dead. An absolutely terrible ending to all of this... but it was an ending, nonetheless. Despite my horror at Cato possibly being dead, there was something calming about the idea that the torment could come to an end.

But if there was a chance that I might be able to stop his death, I had to try. "I'll be back," I said suddenly, jumping up from Finnick's bed and practically collapsing to the floor.

"Where are you going?" Finnick asked.

"To find Seneca," I said.

"Aspen -"

"I'll be right back."

Before Finnick could say anything else, I turned on my heel and sprinted from the room. I was a little woozy and nearly collapsed down a few flights of stairs as I ran, but nothing was going to stop me. I needed to find Seneca. He was the one person who had always sworn to do what he could to help me and get Cato back, no matter what the cost was. But first thing was first. I had to find him. Maybe in the War Room. Maybe in Command. Damn it. I wasn't sure.

It really didn't help that my head was still a little bit heavy from the sedative that they had given me after I had gone off the rails upon seeing the flowers. That was scrambling my thoughts. I didn't even know where Seneca was anyways. But I had to find him and get him to do... something... for me. I had to do something. Sitting here for hours, all day long, potentially even longer, would be far too painful. In fact, it would be excruciating.

Forcing myself to keep upright and not collapse over the edge of the railings as I darted down the stairs, I dashed in and out through the hallways, searching for Seneca the entire time. Haymitch would likely be furious with me for vanishing when he was trying to help me. But I was used to him being angry with me. Besides, I really had to find Seneca. He would be able to help me. He would be able to send me to the Capitol to help with the rescue mission.

Finally, as I rounded the corner to head up to Command, I rammed right into Seneca, who was nearly thrown off of his feet. "Seneca!" I gasped, grabbing onto his arms. "Please -"

"Haymitch told you already, then?" Seneca interrupted.

"Please, help me," I begged.

Seneca wrapped his arms tighter around me, to keep me in my place or from falling, I wasn't quite sure. "Aspen, it's going to be alright. It'll be over soon enough. You'll have your answer," Seneca said softly.

"I need to go with them," I said.

Seneca shook his head slowly. "No, I can't do that."

"Seneca!"

He was supposed to help me. He had promised me that he would always help me when it came to Cato. "Aspen, trust me, I'm trying to help you here. It's not safe to have you in the Capitol."

"I can't just sit here and wait for it to be over! I can't sit here and wait to hear whether they died or not!" I shouted.

Seneca wrapped an arm around my wrist and pulled me off to the side. A number of people were staring at me with something that ranged from pity to confusion. "We have contact with them. We will through the entire thing," Seneca explained, as if that made up for me not getting to be there. "I'll be able to tell you what's going on. Where they are and when they're on their way back."

"Just let me go on the mission with them!" I yelled.

"No, Aspen. If something happens... if the hovercraft is downed... we can't risk having you on it," Seneca said softly.

Obviously he was trying to balance that something could happen and that something wouldn't. "Please -"

"Aspen, the last thing that I want is to hurt you. The last thing that I want is to tell you no. But I have to do it this time," Seneca said. A soft sob escaped my mouth. "You are too valuable and this mission needs to be clinical. No emotional attachments. They had a hard enough time sending Dean and Skye."

So his brother and best friend was allowed to go, but for some reason, I wasn't. "Why do they get to go and I don't?" I asked.

"You know why," Seneca said.

Of course I knew why Dean and Skye were allowed to go. Number one, they both had others to keep their minds occupied. Dean had his daughter and wife. Skye had her friends. They would be heartbroken, but they had the rebellion to think about. Me? I was different. They knew that I would sacrifice a power play for Cato's safe return. And, honestly, who cared about Cato's best friend and brother? Not the Capitol or the rebellion. But they did care about me. They couldn't risk losing me.

"Because they're not as valuable. If they die, it won't matter," I said blankly.

Seneca shook his head as he grasped my hands even tighter. "I'm so sorry, Aspen. I really genuinely am," Seneca said. And I knew that he was. It still didn't change anything. "But they should be back by tonight."

"Seneca -"

"Would you like us to put you under until it's over?" Seneca asked. It was the same thing that Haymitch had offered me. "At least you won't have to sit here and wait."

"No, I can't. I can't go under. I have to know..." I whispered.

"We can give you a muscle relaxer," Seneca suggested. "If nothing else, you should at least be able to calm down."

No... I had to be awake and fully alert for this. "You really can't send me there?" I begged.

Seneca shook his head again. "We can't risk it. Not to mention, when we get Cato back, he'll be furious when he realizes that we allowed you to go to a place where you are a wanted criminal," Seneca explained.

"I don't care what Cato thinks," I snapped. "I just - I... I have to -"

"I know, Aspen. Come here," Seneca whispered.

He knew me well enough to know that I was about to lose it. Seneca put one hand behind my hip and tugged me into him as he used his other hand to push my head into his shoulder. My hands grasped at the fabric on his chest as I began to sob. I just wished that Cato was here. I wished that they were both here and that I didn't have to wait to hear whether or not they were alive. I didn't even get to say goodbye to Gale before he left... We weren't even on speaking terms lately...

What if that little exchange that we had had in the bunker was the last time that we had ever really spoken to each other? What if Cato died during the rescue? Was that kiss before I had walked away from him on the beach really the last time that I had ever seen him? Seneca and I stayed locked together for a few moments until he pushed my chin up with his fingers and gently brushed a few stray tears from my eyes. I tried to fight back the hysteria threatening to rise in me.

"Are you sure that you don't want us to put you under for it?" Seneca asked, pulling back from me.

It probably would have made things easier - in fact, I knew that it would have. But I couldn't just not be around for it. "N - No. You really can't do anything?" I asked pathetically.

"I can promise you that it'll be okay," Seneca said, taking my hands in his own. I pulled back on a slight sob. "They're going to be back here soon. We just wait."

"Where's Cato's family?" I asked.

"Waiting patiently for word," Seneca explained.

"Can you bring me to them?" I asked.

"Yes," Seneca said, motioning him with me. "Come with me."

"Thanks," I mumbled.

The two of us walked together in silence. Seneca's arms were wrapped back around my waist to keep me from falling over. My knees were shaky and weak as they threatened to cave out from under me. People were watching me closely as we walked blankly towards the new barracks. Everyone who was watching must have known what was happening. They must have known that I was waiting on word to hear if my husband and best friend had been killed.

The only thing that I was grateful for was that no one spoke to me. I didn't want to hear anything from them. I didn't want them to talk to me right now. The only thing that I wanted was to have Cato and Gale back, safe and sound. Seneca's arms remained tight over my waist as I fought back tears. They didn't deserve to see me cry. Not after everything that they had done. Just a few more hours and the entire thing would be over. As we made our way towards the barracks, we bumped right into Katniss.

Her eyes were as red as mine were. "Cat," I whispered.

"It's okay, Aspen. It's okay. They're going to be okay," Katniss said.

The two of us said nothing as we brought each other into a tight hug. Seneca released me and took a step back to allow us to stand with each other. This was one of the many moments that showed that we were sisters. Even as destroyed as we both were, we could put ourselves together just long enough to be brave and try and be strong for each other. Katniss tucked her head into my shoulder as I pressed my face into her hair. It felt like hours had passed before we pulled away.

"Gale," I gasped, "he's -"

"I know. I know," Katniss interrupted, shaking her head. "I tried to go with them, but they refused. I think that they thought that it would be too hard on you, to have both of us go."

At least she was one person that I didn't have to worry about. "What if -?"

"Don't," Katniss interrupted, wiping away some tears that were about to fall. "Don't do that. We're not losing him. You're not losing any of them. You should go see the rest of Cato's family. I think that they're all waiting for you. Everyone wanted to see how long it would take for you to wake up."

"Come with me," I begged.

"Of course," Katniss said, sucking in a breath.

She was as heartbroken to hear about Gale's leaving as I was. "Don't leave," I whispered, clasping onto her hand.

"Never," Katniss promised.

Seneca stepped behind the two of us, placing his hands on the middle of our backs and pushing us along. "Come along," Seneca whispered.

By now there were a number of people who were watching us. But I didn't care. The cracks in me were widening, threatening to finally give way to all of the emotion that I had been fighting to suppress for so long. Seneca quickly dropped his hand from Katniss's back, but he kept his on mine. It was probably good that he did, because I was so sure that I was going to drop to the ground and never be able to get back up. Those cracks were only growing bigger and bigger.

My heart skipped a beat as we bounded down a few of the stairs towards the level where Cato's family were bunking. I could only pray that they didn't blame me. Hopefully they were as happy as they normally were. I couldn't stand any more tears today. The three of us continued walking, myself grasping Katniss's hand to keep her walking, until we finally reached the compartment where Cato's family was holed up. It was the first time that I had been there since the bombing.

We stopped at the door and I stared at them. Were they planning on coming in? "We'll wait outside," Seneca said.

Katniss nodded and stepped back with him. I glanced at her for confirmation and she nodded. "Okay," I said.

Turning towards the door, I knocked gently and waited. Was there a chance that they weren't there? Maybe they were like me. Maybe they were trying to find a place to hide, just like I used to do when we had first arrived in Thirteen. I wouldn't blame them. That would be better than standing here where everyone kept giving us pitiful looks. A few moments passed before I heard some clanking behind the door. It opened to reveal a blurry-eyed Alana.

"Aspen. Sweetheart," she said.

Her voice cracked on each syllable. "It's okay. It's okay. It's okay," I whispered.

How many times had I told someone that it was okay? It was what I told Rue before she died. It was what I told Prim, Katniss, Gale, and Ms. Everdeen before I went into the Games for the first time. It was one of the many things that I said to Peeta before he was taken by the dog muttations during the first Games. I said it to the Morphlings during the Quell. All of the people in the hospital in Eight. It seemed that everyone I said it too ended up either dead or with someone that they loved dead.

Now I was telling it to Alana, whose son I loved more than life itself. Maybe I should have said something else, but I couldn't figure out what it was. It was the only thing that I knew to say right now. As I wrapped Alana in my arms, I pressed my head down into her shoulder, sobbing softly. I could hear that she was also sobbing. Her hands wrapped into my hair and they tightened, almost surprising me at how strong she was. The rest of the family slowly stepped forward from behind us.

As Alana cried into my shoulder, and I cried into hers, I glanced back at the rest of the family. Aidan was in the front and I gave him as much of a smile as I could. His eyes were glistening with tears. He had definitely been crying lately. Carrie's eyes were bright red as she cradled a crying Marley to her chest. Of course... her husband was in just as much danger as mine was. I knew exactly how she felt. Damien still looked strong, but even I could see the softness in his eyes.

Julie was staring down at her lap. Her best friend and old crush were in the Capitol. Yes, I knew how she felt too. Once I finally released Alana, I was shocked that Aidan came sprinting up to me. Tears began flooding his cheeks as he pressed his head down into my stomach. Damien wrapped an arm around Alana's shoulder as she cried into his shoulder. I kneeled down onto my knees and wrapped my arms around Aidan's small waist, burying my head in his dark hair.

The entire family watched the two of us remain locked in a hug for a while. I wasn't sure how long passed; I only knew that I wasn't going to let go of him. I had let go of Cato and it had destroyed everything. I wasn't letting go of his brother. A long time must have passed, because eventually Damien placed a hand on Aidan's shoulder and pulled him off of me. Julie gave me a hand to get off of my knees and finally face the rest of the family. There was a briefly tense silence.

"We're glad to see you," Damien said, finally breaking the silence.

"Yeah," I said, trying to suck in a full breath. "I am too."

Aidan walked back up to me as I wrapped an arm over his shoulder. "He's gonna be okay, Aspen. He'll be here tonight," Aidan said confidently.

I wiped a few tears from my eyes, nodding at him. "I know. How - How are you all?" I asked.

Probably just about as well as I was doing with everything. Alana gave a soft nod, staring at me. "We're doing alright. Honestly, we're just glad that it's finally over," Alana said.

It was all over? It felt like this torture was never going to be over. It felt like Cato's predicament was always going to keep me from putting myself back together again. What was it that Finnick had said? It takes ten times as long to put yourself together again as it does to fall apart. I had fallen apart so many times already. Now I had to put myself back together. And there was only one way to do that. Getting Cato and Gale back. What came after would work itself out in the future.

"They're going to get him and tonight we'll know, one way or another," Alana breathed.

"Finnick said the same thing," I explained. "I just - I just wanted to check on you."

"They're coming back. They are," Carrie said, her voice barely audible.

"They are," I repeated, grasping her hands.

At the same time, Alana darted over and pulled Carrie into a hug. "They're all going to be okay. They said that they're going to be back by tonight, as long as everything goes well," Damien said, as usual, trying to remain the strong father figure.

If any of us had the potential to be strong right now, it was Damien. "Yes. That's what they told me too," I whispered. I took in a deep breath, preparing to say something that I should have said a long time ago. "I just wanted to say something. I'm so sorry, about all of this. If Cato had never met me or if he would have just killed me during the first Games, none of this would have happened. You would still have him. You wouldn't have to be waiting to see if he was alive or not."

I was about to go on about how much pain I had caused when Julie stepped in. "Stop it, Aspen," she snapped.

"She's right. You have to stop blaming yourself. The past can't be changed," Carrie added.

"You know something..." Julie breathed, walking up to me. "None of us liked you when we first heard about you. Especially not when we realized that Cato cared for you. But it changed pretty damn quickly. The moment that we realized that you genuinely loved him and vice versa. Cato is absolutely in love with you and he would take every beating, every accident, if it meant that he got to know you. You are something that he's never known before. True love."

"But -" I started.

"But nothing, Aspen," Damien interrupted harshly, but not entirely unkindly. "Cato is coming back here tonight. Dean and Skye are coming back here tonight. We are all going to be back together again. The fight will be over soon enough. Then we'll all be able to move on. Who knows? Maybe you two will finally get to build that life together that you always deserved."

The life that the two of us deserved. What kind of life was that? One without the Hunger Games. One where I didn't have to be afraid, where no one had to be afraid, of what might happen if their name was pulled from the Reaping Ball. A life where the two of us didn't have to worry about starving to death. No more acting our parts. The cruel Career. The ice-cold Girl on Fire. We could be a married couple who loved each other more than anything. And who knew? Maybe even a real family one day.

"This shouldn't have happened," I breathed.

The rest of the family shook their heads in agreement. "No. It shouldn't have. But it did. And we're making the best of it," Alana said, trying to force a smile. "He's going to be back tonight."

Maybe if we said that enough times, it would be true. "Will you be around?" I asked.

"We'll be up in Command soon enough, waiting for news," Alana said.

"Me too," I said.

"Do you want them to -?"

"Knock me out until this is over?" I interrupted Julie. She smiled guiltily. Did people really think that I was that weak? Maybe I was. "They keep offering me that, but I keep refusing. I don't want to be asleep. I want to know, and if something happens... I don't know. I don't want to pretend that things are okay. I just - I don't know."

Honestly I wasn't sure what I wanted. I didn't want to be sedated for the entire thing. I didn't really have a good reason. I just didn't want to have to wake up to the news that I had lost both of them. Not that I wanted to be awake either. Having to hear each clock in Thirteen ticking away the minutes. Maybe the last few of their lives. Nothing was a good choice. But at least if I was awake, I would know the second that we had news.

"You need to know. We understand. Trust me, we understand," Carrie said.

If there was one person who knew exactly how I felt, or at least close to it, it was Carrie. "Dean is going to be okay," I told her before turning to Julie. "So will Skye."

"And so will Cato," Aidan said.

"So will Cato," I repeated. I had to leave before I burst into tears. "I'll be back soon."

Being here with them right now was too painful. They all reminded me of him. They reminded me of what I stood to lose tonight. "We'll all be up in Command soon. We expect that they're going to want you there for something to distract the Capitol with," Damien said in his usually cool manner.

"Okay," I said.

Before I got the chance to leave, Alana reached out and grabbed onto my arm. "Try not to focus on it. Try to think of something else," she advised.

"Yeah. Let me know how that works out for you," I said.

The entire family smiled slightly, probably something that we all needed desperately. Just a few more hours, Aspen," Damien said.

His hand wrapped over my shoulder as he stared down into my eyes, finally showing me just a hint of emotion. Just the way that Cato had done before we had fallen completely in love. What was it that Damien had once said to me? That even though he was hard on his kids, he loved them and never wanted anything bad to happen to them. How he could even tolerate me was beyond me, considering everything that I had done to them. Of course, I supposed that I was also now one of them.

"A few more," Damien breathed.

"A few more," I repeated.

This time it was Carrie that stopped me from leaving. "Before you go..." I stopped in my tracks and turned back to her. "Cato gave me this before the Quell. He passed it to me before the Interviews that night. He said to give it to you when the time was right. I wasn't sure when the time was right until now. I think that it's the right time."

She handed me a folded up piece of paper. "Thank you," I said, taking it and tucking it into my pocket. "Have you read it?"

Carrie shook her head. "No. It was only ever meant for you."

"Thanks."

It was almost impossible to resist the temptation to open the letter. The time still didn't feel right. Maybe it would soon, but it wasn't yet. Maybe it would be the right time when Cato finally died. I wasn't sure. But it wasn't right now. So I made sure to secure it in my pocket before giving the family a gentle smile. When it came down to it, they had just as much up to lose tonight as I did. If they were holding it together, I would too.

Before I left the compartment, I stopped to hug each member of the family. Aidan had the hardest time letting go. The two of us were definitely on the same page since I had saved him from being locked out of the bunker. I sniffled gently in his shoulder as I let go of him. Looking at him, I saw Cato, who I wanted back so desperately. We would all be so much happier once it was over. I could finally be the real Mockingjay. I would be able to stand against Snow without worrying about what happened to Cato.

As I released Aidan, I stepped back out of the compartment. Katniss and Seneca were leaning up against the wall chatting softly, but they straightened up the moment that I walked out. They looked extremely concerned over the fact that I had obviously just been crying. The two of them darted over to where I was, looking like they were having a hard time not giving me a hug. Seneca was the first to figure out what to say.

"Is everything okay?" he asked carefully.

It was a stupid question, but a warranted one. "Yes," I said numbly. "I'll go back to the hospital now."

As we walked, Seneca turned to us. "I'm needed up in Command. I'll see you in just a little bit though," he said.

"Okay," I mumbled.

Katniss nodded her consent. Once Seneca walked off, she placed her hand behind my back. "Come on," she said.

All I wanted to do was stop and go back to Seneca, beg him to help me, but I knew that he wouldn't. Not right now. He cared for both the rebellion and me, which meant that he wasn't going to dare risk my life. Partially because of the rebellion and what it needed and partially because he really didn't want to see me get hurt. I walked alongside Katniss as the two of us headed back to the hospital and back to Finnick. When we walked into his room I saw that he was still playing with his rope.

As we seated ourselves on his bed, he continued playing. But his hands were still shaking. It was obvious that we were all panicked over what was happening. The one thing that we didn't have any control over. We weren't a part of this plan and we weren't ever going to be a part of it. For the first time in a long time, I would have no role to play. I was nothing more than a passenger, doomed to watch the train either go up in flames or finally arrive at its destination.

A few minutes passed before Finnick finally seemed to officially realize that I was back. "What did you see?" Finnick asked.

"Cato's family and Seneca. I just - I had to talk to them," I stuttered.

"How are they?" Finnick asked.

Just the slightest bit better than I am. "They're fine. At least, they're okay. Seneca has been waiting and he's making sure that everything's okay. He's watching over them," I said. Finnick nodded blankly. "Cato's family, I think that they're just praying that he's... alive."

"We'll have them back, Aspen," Finnick promised.

His hand laid gently on my knee but I could tell that he didn't completely mean it. He didn't look like he meant it. In fact, he looked like he was debating on going back to bed and trying to wait it out. As much as I wanted to open my mouth and confirm that everything would be okay and that we would have them back, I couldn't force the words out of my throat. They were lodged there as I weighed their merit back and forth. I could only pray that they would all be okay.

Not just Cato and Gale. I had to make sure that Skye and Dean and all of the rest of those soldiers came back. I didn't want anyone else to die for me. Besides, they all had families and friends that they wanted to come back to, too. All that was left to do now was hope that there was the slightest chance that they would all make it out of the Capitol alive. The three of us sat in silence for a little while, our hands all clasped together. We all knew how the others felt.

Katniss was missing Gale. Finnick was missing Annie. I was missing Cato, Gale, Dean, and Skye. If they all died... I didn't want to think about it. It felt like years had passed before the curtain finally yanked back and there was Haymitch. I jumped up from the bed and practically sprang over to him. He didn't waste any time or niceties, as usual, telling us that he had a job for us, if we could pull it together. They still needed post-bombing footage of Thirteen.

"If we can get it in the next few hours, Beetee can air it leading up to the rescue, and maybe keep the Capitol's attention elsewhere," Haymitch said.

"Yes, a distraction. A decoy of sorts," Finnick said.

Anything that kept the Capitol from realizing that some of our own people were starting to infiltrate their airspace. Every time that we got onto the Capitol's airwaves, it caused a huge problem for them. They dropped everything to try and get us off of the airwaves and start proving to their loyal members that we were the real villains. Yes, they would need someone to cause even the slightest distraction while they were in the Capitol. What could we say, though?

"What we really need is something so riveting that even President Snow won't be able to tear himself away. Got anything like that?" Haymitch asked.

How many things could I say that would attract the attention of the Capitol? Anything that I said seemed to attract their attention. There were a number, and each one was more damaging than the next. Even more than my own thoughts, there was a good chance that Finnick would have a million things to showcase. Between he and Seneca and Plutarch and the rest of the Capitol refugees that we had here, we would be able to distract them for the ten minutes that they would need in the Tribute Center.

"I think we all do. Let's do it," I said seriously.

Having a job that might help the mission snapped me into focus. My heartbreak could wait. Right now the only thing that I had to focus on was whatever we would do to help the mission. Anything to keep Snow off of Gale's scent. Anything to keep Cato from potentially being killed before they got there. Finnick, Katniss, and I sprung from the bed. She looked as heartbroken as I was. But at least we finally had something to distract ourselves from simply waiting.

While I knocked down breakfast and got prepped by the rest of the team, I tried to think of what I might say. President Snow must have at least been wondering how that blood-splattered floor and his roses were affecting me. Not well, just the way that he would be expecting. If he wanted me broken, then I would have to be whole. But I didn't think that I would convince him of anything by shouting a couple of defiant lines at the camera. Besides, that wouldn't buy the rescue team any time.

Outbursts were short. It was stories that took time. And I had a number of stories to tell. I didn't know if it would work, but when the television crew was all assembled above ground, I asked Cressida if she could start out by asking me about Peeta, Cato, and Gale. Three people who meant the most to me in the world. One was gone, which might make it even more impactful. I took a seat on the fallen marble pillar where I had my breakdown and waited for the red light and Cressida's question.

"How did you meet Peeta?" she finally asked.

For a moment my voice stuck in my throat. What could I say? What was I supposed to say? It was easy enough. I was supposed to say the exact same thing that I had told Cato on the roof the night before our first Games. The words had come so easily when directed towards him. So I pretended that I was speaking to him. Like I was retelling him the story. Taking a deep breath, I did the one thing that Haymitch had wanted since my first Interview. I opened up.

"When I met Peeta, I was thirteen years old, and I was almost dead."

It seemed to go on for hours. Each time that I started to run out of things to say, I started detailing even more about what had caused us to get to the point where we had needed Peeta to save us. Finally I got around to talking about that awful day when we tried to sell the baby clothes in the rain, how Peeta's mother chased us from the bakery door, and how he took a beating to bring us the loaves of bread that saved our lives. Everyone listened with rapt attention.

To my surprise, even Katniss stepped in to give a few comments about Peeta. She recounted the many times that she had caught him staring at her, only to look away moments later. It was the first time that I had heard her speak so openly about her near-nonexistent relationship with Peeta. During her explanation, I saw that she was having a hard time not crying, thinking about him. His loss was never something that she liked to talk about. But I was impressed that she managed.

The others were fascinated by listening to Katniss talk about Peeta, something that hadn't been addressed since that first moment where he had revealed that he was in love with her during the first Interviews. I had always wondered what could have become of them. The Capitol people had been fascinated by the idea of their relationship but it had easily been overridden by Cato and I's, which they could actually see grow. What would have happened if Katniss had gone into the Games with him?

"We had never even spoken. The first time I ever talked to Peeta was on the train to the Games," I finally finished.

Cressida let it sink in for a moment before asking, "What about Gale?"

"He's not really my cousin. He's not Katniss's either. It was all a clever lie created by the Capitol," I said.

Even in the small group of people standing around me, I could see the shock. I supposed that people really didn't understand that we weren't related. Good thing that none of them saw the kiss back in Twelve. That would have made for an awkward conversation. First I talked about the lie that was created by Snow after my romance with Cato in the Games had become such a huge deal and a key factor in the two of us winning together, following with the threat to all of our lives to keep it going.

Knowing that it might have made me a little less sympathetic towards the audience, I even mentioned that Gale and I had indeed shared a kiss before the first Games. He would likely hate me for saying all of this, but if I kept talking and kept Snow's attention off of him, that was all that mattered. The entire film team seemed fascinated as I described the tense but loyal friendship that I had always felt towards Gale. I was careful not to mix in stories about Cato with Gale.

They were two completely separate people and deserved two very different conversations. Finally I explained how Gale and I had met that fateful day that I had stolen his squirrels right from under him, leading to our initial partnership, filled with mistrust and suspicion, but how we had finally let each other in and had become inseparable after that. The others were fascinated with the stories about both Gale and Peeta, but I knew what they really wanted to get to.

"Tell me about Cato," Cressida prompted.

"My parents were both in the Games. My father competed first. In the Fifty-Fifth Hunger Games. He was killed by the District 2 male in the Death Match. My mother was Reaped two years later. She, just like him, was killed by the District 2 male in the Death Match. When I was Reaped, I made promises. That I would try. That I would win. But my only concern was killing the District 2 male," I said, remembering my desperation to kill Cato before I knew who he was. "When I watched the Reaping tape..."

My voice dropped off as I remembered that day. I had just taken a shower for the first time and had moved out into the living room, watching the Reaping tapes. He had spoken so fast that I had been shocked. The moment that I had seen Cato for the first time I realized just how huge he was. I knew that I couldn't kill him. He was the perfect Tribute. I had known that. But I had also been fascinated with him. He was beautiful. And in my own brilliant words...

'... if I wasn't thinking about how to kill him, I'd probably be thinking about how to jump his bones.' The memory almost coaxed a grin out of me.

"What did you think?" Cressida asked softly.

"That I couldn't kill him. He was too strong," I said, deciding to opt out of revealing my real thoughts. When Cato was back, if he knew that, he would never let me live it down. "I met him for the first time when I was getting my legs waxed. He threatened to kill me."

Everyone laughed at that. Even I gave the slightest smile. "What happened?" Cressida asked.

Even now I didn't know what had happened. I still didn't know how we had fallen in love. It had just happened. "I was an idiot. We riled each other up. I kept coming back for more. So did he. One day he wasn't just someone who could kill me anymore. He was... I don't know. He was someone that I couldn't live without," I mumbled stupidly.

"He used to say something to you in the first Games," Cressida said. I nodded for her to continue. "He would say that you weren't what he was expecting. What did that mean?"

"You're nothing like I thought you would be. Just so you know."

That slight smile that he had given me. The beginning of the end. Those words that had come back to us so many times before. Those words that still came back to me now. Even now when I thought about him. He had proven time and time again that he wasn't what I had originally expected. Saving me in the Bloodbath, saving me from the Careers more times than I could count, helping me after the fire, getting me the medicine from the wolf mutt, and so many other times.

The words stuck in my throat. "I told him that on the roof before the Games. I told him that he wasn't what I was expecting because he really wasn't. He wasn't cold. He wasn't cruel. I barely knew him... he was trying to kill me... he had threatened to kill me more times than I would care to admit... but..." I trailed off, unable to figure out where to go from there.

"But he was already in love with you," Cressida said.

"I guess so," I mumbled.

He had told me that he, in his own way, was in love with me from the moment that he had seen me on the Reaping tape. But it had changed over time. Either way, I allowed myself a small smile. Cato had always been so confident that he was in love with me. There was never a doubt in his mind about his love for me. I tried to push off my own thoughts about how confused I was about love. All that mattered was that Cato loved me. We would work from there.

"How are you doing with the separation?" Cressida asked after a beat of silence.

"Not well," I said honestly. "I know at any moment Snow could kill him. Especially since he warned Thirteen about the bombing. It's a terrible thing to live with. But because of what they're putting him through, I don't have any reservations anymore. About doing whatever it takes to destroy the Capitol. I'm finally free."

One way or another, I was going to be free after tonight. He would either be dead and I could exact my revenge on Snow for what he had done to me and Cato and everyone else that I cared about, even those who I didn't know. Even better, I could have Cato back and the two of us could each have our own revenge on Snow. For what he had done to me for my entire life and for what he had done to Cato in the Capitol. I slowly turned my gaze skyward and watched the flight of a hawk across the sky.

"President Snow once admitted to me that the Capitol was fragile. At the time, I didn't know what he meant. It was hard to see clearly because I was so afraid. Now I'm not. The Capitol's fragile because it depends on the Districts for everything. Food, energy, even the Peacekeepers that police us. If we declare our freedom, the Capitol collapses." I dropped my voice to a strong whisper. "President Snow, thanks to you, I'm officially declaring mine today."

Everyone went dead silent at my words. I let out a few soft breaths as I finally stared back at the red light on the camera. As for anything that I had said today, the last sentence was the only thing that I wanted to get to the Capitol. When Cressida called cut, I could tell that she was more than thrilled at what she had gotten from me. She hadn't had to drag anything out of me and had only had to help me along with a few lines. It was definitely the most I had opened up in a long time.

Clearly everyone else was thrilled as well. I had been sufficient, if not dazzling. Everyone loved the bread story. They adored the story about Cato and finally learning the truth about what it was that Cato and I so often said to each other. I barely realized that no one ever knew what it meant. The lines about Gale were also well-liked, but I could tell that they weren't going to make it into the broadcast. Gale was still a touchy subject all around, and not something that Cato needed to hear once he was back.

Other than the stories about the three men, it was my message to President Snow that got the wheels spinning in Plutarch's brain. He hastily called Finnick and Haymitch over and they had a brief but intense conversation that I could see that Haymitch wasn't happy with. I tried to eavesdrop, but I kept being pushed back. Eventually Seneca was brought into the conversation. He looked terrified, but was nodding. Plutarch seemed to win. Finnick - like Seneca - was pale but nodding his head by the end of it.

As Finnick moved to take my seat before the camera, Haymitch told him, "You don't have to do this."

"Yes, I do. If it will help her." Finnick balled up his rope in his hand. "I'm ready."

What the hell were the three of them talking about? Another chair was brought out for Seneca to sit in and I stared at them. It didn't make sense, what they were doing. Weren't my words enough? I didn't know what to expect. A love story about Annie? An account of the abuses in District 4? Maybe like District 12? But Finnick Odair took a completely different tack. One that dawned on me just seconds before he started speaking. I dashed up to him, breaking past the others, and grabbed his arm.

"Finnick -"

"It's okay, Aspen," Finnick said, pulling away from me. "It's okay."

"No," I gasped. "No, it isn't."

Haymitch joined us, grabbing my arm and bringing me along with him. "Come on. We're going downstairs to Command," he said.

It was in a tone that said that he didn't want me to fight him on this one. "Wait a second," I snapped.

"Go with them," Seneca said, walking up to me.

"What are you doing?" I asked sharply.

"Go," Seneca ordered.

That was when it dawned on me, what the both of them were planning to do. Of course Finnick was going to tell the truth of what Snow had forced him to do. But Seneca was also planning to tell the truth. Maybe a lot about Snow - as I assumed that he knew a great deal. But he was also planning on telling the truth about what had conspired between us. And I couldn't tolerate him doing that. It would hurt too many people, himself included. It wasn't worth it to hurt Snow for that.

"Don't. Don't do this," I said, stepping in front of Seneca. He tried to sidestep me, but I moved again. "Seneca, if you tell them what happened between us after the first Games -"

"It's time, Aspen. It's time to face the truth," Seneca said, grabbing my hands.

"Stop it. You don't have to do this. You know what's going to happen in here the second that you tell them the truth," I warned. He would be shunned, at the very least. "No one has to know."

No matter what happened, it wouldn't be good for anyone. Seneca was going to doom himself if he told the truth of what had happened between the two of us. The residents of Thirteen were already weary of the Capitol rebels, if they found out what had happened between us after the Games, they would never trust him. They might even try to kick him out of Thirteen. And I needed him here. He was one of my best friends and most trusted confidantes. He couldn't leave.

Seneca must have seen the panicked look in my eyes as he grabbed my hands and brought me into him. "I have done some very terrible things in my life, Aspen," Seneca explained. True, but he didn't need to do this. "For a long time I've run from them. It's time for me to stop running. They need you down in Command. And there's something that I need to do here."

"Please don't," I begged.

"Come on, Aspen," Katniss said, trying to pull me along with her.

But I pushed her off. "Seneca -"

"It's going to be okay," Seneca interrupted.

The two of us stood together as Seneca moved into me. Katniss took a step back as Seneca leaned down and pressed a kiss against my temple. Likely because he would never be able to do it again. I opened my mouth to beg him not to tell the truth one more time when Katniss wrapped a hand around my arm and dragged me with her and Haymitch. I looked back to see Cressida repositioning Finnick and Seneca to make the propo. Seneca only gave me a reassuring nod as I walked off.

"Okay, Finnick?" Cressida asked.

"Yeah. Yeah."

"Go in the center there. Those rocks. Castor, to left. Pollux, you're with me. So we'll go straight to camera. Okay?" Cressida asked. As we walked off, I heard that there was no answer. "Finnick?"

"Yeah," Finnick muttered.

"Seneca, are you ready?" Cressida asked.

"Yes."

"Okay. Take your time. Just remember to keep talking and don't stop," Cressida instructed.

As they started setting up the cameras, Haymitch, Katniss, and I headed downstairs back into Thirteen. My heart was pounding in my chest as we walked away from the rest of the team. I wanted to be able to hear them, but I couldn't right now. Hopefully I would able to watch from Command. If I was lucky, it wouldn't broadcast to Thirteen. Seneca would become the most hated man in here. Even if he had done so many things to make his actions up to me since then.

The three of us headed up through the hallways to get into Command. As we walked into the room, I glanced around. Alana and the rest of the Hadley's were already there. The only exception was Marley, who I assumed was being taken care of by someone else. Of course Carrie would want to be here. Brutus, Beetee, and Coin were already there as Katniss, Haymitch, and I arrived. The others were out playing and getting ready for the propo.

Eventually the video came onto the screen to Finnick and Seneca standing in the rubble above ground. "This is Finnick Odair."

"And Seneca Crane."

Neither one of them wore any hint of an emotion on their faces. I couldn't believe it. Especially knowing the great regret that Seneca felt for what had happened between the two of us. Because he had said it and had promised that he would try and make it up to me for the rest of my life. As for Finnick... he was going to finally have to admit where that monstrous string of lovers had come from. I wondered if anyone knew, save Annie, Haymitch, and myself.

Katniss and I stood in front of the screen, watching it curiously. "Winner of the Sixty-Fifth Hunger Games. Along with the previous Head Gamemaker," Finnick said, motioning to himself and Seneca. "And we're coming to you from District Thirteen, alive and well. We've survived an assault from the Capitol, but we're not here to give you recent news."

"Why are Finnick and Seneca doing a propo?" Katniss asked.

"It's a lot more than that," Haymitch said.

I swallowed a lump in my throat, knowing where this was going. "Beetee's commandeered the system," Coin explained, looking up from her spot behind Beetee's computer.

"Now that they're down to generator power there's a more limited range of frequencies available to them. And I'm filling them all up with Finnick and Seneca," Beetee added.

"Not many will see it, but whoever does will think it's another propo," Plutarch said, grinning as usual.

"What they don't know is this broadcast is jamming their entire system with noise," Beetee said. My ears perked up. This was designed to distract the Capitol. "Early defense warning, internal communications, everything. As long as the broadcast goes through, our team should be able to get in and out undetected."

My heart skipped a beat. Maybe we would actually be able to get in and out without a problem. No one would be hurt. Gale would come back with Dean and Skye. They would both be just fine. Cato would come back here once and for all. He would take some time to get back to normal, but the two of us would be back together. We would fall back in love with each other, all over again. As Finnick's broadcast continued, I glanced back up at the screen.

"The truth, not the myths about a life of luxury. Not the lie about glory for your homeland. You can survive the arena," Finnick began in a flat, removed tone. "The moment you leave, you're a slave. President Snow used to... sell me... my body, that is. I wasn't the only one. If a Victor is considered desirable, the president gives them as a reward or allows people to buy them for an exorbitant amount of money. If you refuse, he kills someone you love. So you do it."

The shock waves went throughout the room as stares were exchanged. Even Coin looked the slightest bit surprised. I guessed that people really didn't know about it. After all, before I was a Victor, I'd had no idea. Katniss's head shot over to me and I nodded. She hadn't known that it had happened to someone other than me. At least, she hadn't known who it was. On a screen next to Finnick and Seneca's broadcast were the team headed to the Capitol with their stats.

Mutters erupted throughout the room as everyone started trying to piece together what had been happening over the past seventy-five years. Talking about the Victors who had a stream of never-ending lovers. Wondering if the Victors from their District had been forced into slavery. Wondering who it had been. Carrie gave me a look, as if to ask if Finnick was telling the truth, and I gave her a slight nod. She was likely thinking what everyone else in Panem was.

That his explanation explained it. Finnick's consistent parade of lovers in the Capitol. They were never real lovers. Just people like our old Head Peacekeeper, Cray, who bought desperate girls to devour and discard because he could. I had nearly fallen prey to him, after all. It looked like Katniss wanted to interrupt the taping and beg Finnick's forgiveness for every false thought that she had ever had about him. But we had a job to do, and I sensed that Finnick's role would be far more effective than mine.

"I wasn't the only one, but I was the most popular. And perhaps the most defenseless, because the people I loved were so defenseless," Finnick continued. Annie. He really had protected her. "To make themselves feel better, my patrons would make presents of money or jewelry, but I found a much more valuable form of payment."

Secrets, I realized. That was how he had managed to figure out so much about the Capitol. That was how he had pulled the trick of the fake sonogram during the Quell. There was a secret that he had been able to hold over someone's head. It was just part of what made Finnick so threatening to Snow. His secrets. After all, that was what Finnick told me his lovers paid him in, only at first I thought the whole arrangement was by his choice.

"Secrets," Finnick said, echoing my thoughts. "And this is where you're going to want to stay tuned, President Snow, because so very many of them were about you. But let's begin with some of the others."

"Including me," Seneca said, standing from his seat.

For just a brief moment, I gave a slight twitch. It was enough for Katniss's gaze to snap over to me. She knew the watered-down version of what had happened that night. She knew what was coming. A few murmurs echoed through the room as the others tried to figure out who it was that Seneca had bought. Haymitch reached behind me and laid a hand on my shoulder. He knew that this was something that I had never wanted to get out. But it was time. I knew that it was.

Especially if it meant that everyone who went to the Capitol was going to be fine. As Seneca went into his explanation of how the Gamemakers occasionally got to have their choice in Victors - or how they always had their favorite Tributes - I turned to the other screens that were focused on the rescue. Boggs, Gale, Dean, Skye, and two others were headed towards the Capitol. They must have been getting close by now since they had left not long after I had been knocked out.

"Mockingjay One, you are twenty seconds from perimeter defense," one of the District 13 system operators called out.

"Ten seconds," the pilot counted. "Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five." I closed my eyes, praying that they wouldn't be shot down the second that they entered their airspace. "Four. Three. Two. One."

A few beats passed. "No response from perimeter defense," the second pilot said. Beetee smacked the table in glee. I let out a breath that I had been holding for too long. "We're inside Capitol airspace."

"You see, after the Mockingjay's first Games, my life was in grave danger from President Snow," Seneca continued. "He thought that I was a fool for not killing one of them during their final stand of the Games. Aspen Antaeus had caught my attention long before she entered the arena. She fascinated me. When President Snow offered me an ultimatum at the end of the Games, I knew my options. Die after failing to produce only one Victor, or make a promise. Break Aspen Antaeus. At any cost.

"So I became her sole buyer, during which time I saw just how much it hurt her. She kept her promise to never mention our situation to Cato Hadley; if she had, his family would have died. One by one. In time, I began to realize that I couldn't keep hurting her. But I was never able to take back what I did to her. I was never able to change all of the damage that I did in her mind. She is just one of the many," Seneca said.

As Seneca went even further into detail, I tried to block out his announcement. Everything from spotting me the moment that I had volunteered, to his desperation for me during training and into the Games, to him convincing Snow to allow him to take me after the Games - the only reason that he was still alive for the Quell. He even went deeper into detail about what had happened between us. Everything from the unwanted kiss in the control room to the night of Cato and I's engagement.

Off to the side, I could see Katniss's look of horror. She knew about what had happened that night, but I had never gone into detail. Seneca wasn't sparing any. Gazes all around the room were locked onto me as Haymitch pulled me into his side, trying to protect me from their stares. Alana was staring at me blankly. Damien and Aidan both looked like they were trying to find a way that it was a lie. Carrie looked like she was about to burst into tears.

Knowing that I wasn't helping anything, I pulled out of Haymitch's embrace and straightened my spine. I wasn't going to fall to pieces right now. If Seneca and Finnick could pull themselves together to do this, so could I. Besides, this wasn't the real issue right now. The only thing that mattered was that they got in and out of the Capitol without being caught. I tried to tune out the conversation between Finnick and Seneca. But I could only tune them out for so long.

"Is - Is he telling the truth?" Alana asked breathlessly.

"Yes," I said tonelessly.

That was when I realized that Alana was crying, staring at me like she had never seen me before. "He did this to you?" she asked.

"Nothing ever happened," I said.

"Who did he threaten?" Alana asked.

All of you. Your dead daughter. "It doesn't matter," I muttered.

The entire family came to walk over to me, but Haymitch shook his head, motioning them backwards. Haymitch clearly didn't want them near me. He knew that I needed to be alone right now. I didn't want to talk to them. I never wanted to mention this. I never wanted anyone to bring up what had happened between Seneca and I ever again. I had been doing so well moving past it. Julie's fists were bunched as she stared at the screen.

Just as I had been expecting, Seneca had likely just made himself one of the least popular people in Thirteen. Just when people had been starting to trust him, too. Mutters had erupted through the room. I could even hear people accusing me of being unfaithful to Cato these days, because of my friendship with Seneca. The Hadley's were quick to snap their rebuttals. I held up a hand, silently asking them to stop. They didn't need to defend me or that night.

The people in Thirteen were more than welcome to think whatever they wanted. Because I knew the truth and I knew that Seneca had changed since those days back in the Capitol, after the Games. Others in the room were horrified. Some people were even suggesting to throw Seneca back to the Capitol and let them kill him. I wanted to argue, but I was brought back to the Capitol mission. Seneca had doomed himself and I would try to help, but right now my attention needed to be elsewhere.

Back on the far screen, the hovercraft containing the rescue team was approaching the Capitol. "Gear up!" Boggs called to the rest of the team.

"Switching to Night View," the second pilot said.

In the meantime, Finnick and Seneca began to weave a tapestry so rich in detail that you couldn't doubt its authenticity. Tales of strange sexual appetites, betrayals of the heart, bottomless greed, and bloody power plays. Drunken secrets whispered over damp pillow-cases in the dead of night. Finnick was someone bought and sold. A District slave. A handsome one, certainly, but in reality, harmless. Who would he tell? And who would believe him if he did? But some secrets were too delicious not to share.

Not to mention everything that Seneca knew. It turned out that being a Gamemaker - and a Head Gamemaker at that - made him privy to a great number of secrets. The fragility of the Capitol, some of those in the Capitol who bordered in between being a rebel and a Capitol loyalist, and just how little of a hold President Snow had over the rest of his people. It was fascinating to listen to, and perhaps something that would make Seneca a little less hated - a task that would certainly take some time.

When it came back around, I didn't know the people Finnick and Seneca named - all seemed to be prominent Capitol citizens - but I knew, from listening to the chatter of my Prep Team, the attention the mildest slip in judgment could draw. If a bad haircut could lead to hours of gossip, what would charges of incest, back-stabbing, blackmail, and arson produce? Even as the waves of shock and recrimination rolled over the Capitol, the people there would be waiting, as I was now, to hear about the president.

On the other screen, Boggs was pointing ahead to the Tribute Center. "There."

My heart skipped a beat. They were right there. Cato would be in their grasp within minutes. "Command, we have visual on the Tribute Center," the second pilot said.

"Initiating final approach," the District 13 systems operator ordered.

The hovercraft swirled in the air as Finnick continued to speak about the depravity, deceit, and cruelty that went on in the Capitol. It was stunning to listen to, really. I knew how terrible things were there, but I had never guessed that it went this far. As Finnick and Seneca recounted their lives and knowledge of the Capitol, I saw the team approach the Tribute Center. It looked more ominous than it ever had before. Once they landed, Boggs voice echoed through the microphone.

"Masks on."

"And now, on to our good President Coriolanus Snow," Finnick said, drawing my attention back to him. "Such a young man when he rose to power. Such a clever one to keep it. How, you must ask yourself, did he do it? One word. That's all you really need to know. Poison."

"Open the door," Boggs ordered on the other screen. The aircraft hatchet opened at his order. "Command, this is Team Leader. Prepare to deploy gas. We will confirm once inside. Get ready to drop."

They were hovering right over the glass ceiling of the Tribute Center. Cato couldn't have been far from them. They would see him at any given moment. All they had to do was get past the people who might have been trying to cut them off. But the gas that they had dropped would ensure that no one would still be conscious by the time that they got there. Using ropes attached to the hovercraft, Boggs and the rest of the team dropped down into the Tribute Center.

As much as I wanted to listen to their mission and see every inch of it, there was something else that had drawn my attention. How President Snow made his way up to the top of the ladder. It was never something that was talked about in the history lessons that were mandatory. Likely because it painted him in a bad light. So, praying that nothing bad would happen to them while I looked away, I began listening to the tale that was likely capturing the attention of everyone in the nation.

Finnick went back to Snow's political ascension, which I and everyone else in Command knew nothing of, and he worked his way up to the present, pointing out case after case of the mysterious deaths of Snow's adversaries or, even worse, his allies who had the potential to become threats. People dropping dead at a feast or slowly, inexplicably declining into shadows over a period of months. Blamed on bad shellfish, elusive viruses, or an overlooked weakness in the aorta.

Seneca even went into detail of just how close he himself had come to being executed. He told us everything about the day that he had nearly been killed. Being locked in a room with only a bowl of Nightlock. Commit suicide or starve to death. Begging for a meeting with Snow. Using me as a bargaining chip to keep himself alive. Working back into Snow's good graces, eventually becoming friendly with Plutarch, and eventually joining the rebellion without ever tipping Snow off to the problem.

He was one of the few to never be caught. To my fascination, Snow apparently drank from the poisoned cup himself to deflect suspicion. But antidotes didn't always work. They said that it was why he wore the roses that reeked of perfume. They said that it was to cover the scent of blood from the mouth sores that would never heal. Of course. He doesn't drink blood. It was wine that was laced with the blood from his mouth. They said, they said, they said... Snow had a list and no one knew who would be next.

All of it made perfect sense. I couldn't believe that I hadn't ever realized that it wasn't just my mind playing tricks on me. Of course, for the last year and a half I had thought that I was insane. But I really had smelled the blood. It turned out that there always was some truth in lies. For all of these years, people really had been telling the truth... But they had never really known. It was always poison. The perfect weapon for a snake.

"Clear," Gale's voice came as they landed in the Tribute Center.

On their screen, I could see that all of the Peacekeepers were laying on the ground, having been knocked out by the gas. "Clear. Command, we're inside. Heading toward target number one. Cell P45 lower level 2C," Boggs was instructing. "Gas."

As Finnick continued to speak about the various discrepancies of the Capitol, I looked back towards the screen that was showing the broadcast of their attack on the Capitol. My heart was pounding as I watched through Boggs's security camera. I could see Dean, Skye, and Gale standing off to the side with the other rescuers. They were standing in front of the door - the one that evidently held Cato behind it. They were so close... But what if there were guards?

"Gale," Boggs whispered.

Placing my hand over my mouth, I watched as the team opened the door that they were standing behind, just as Finnick started talking about who Snow really was. A man who killed without mercy. A man who ruled with deception and fear. Nasty words, but so very true. I glanced back at the screen where the rescue team were. They were deep inside the room, walking around to try and find Cato. But the only thing in there were tubes of some type of drug. It looked like a laboratory.

Terrified of what might happen, I thought to Finnick's broadcast. Since my opinion of the Capitol and its noble president were already so low, I couldn't say that Finnick and Seneca's allegations shocked me. They seemed to have far more effect on the displaced Capitol rebels like my crew, Fulvia, and Effie – even Plutarch occasionally reacted in surprise, maybe wondering how a specific tidbit passed him by. They all looked horrified and shocked about Seneca's explanation of our night together.

Effie was muttering, "That's what the meeting was about."

She seemed to still be stuck on that simple fact, even long after Seneca had stopped speaking about it. She couldn't believe that she was the one who had brought me to him. I wanted to tell her that it was alright, but I was too busy watching the screen that was still broadcasting the rescue mission. When Finnick and Seneca finally finished their stories, they just kept the cameras rolling until finally he had to be the one to say 'Cut.' No one, me included, wanted it to end.

The crew hurried off to a spare computer station to edit the material to send off to the rest of Panem, mostly to keep the Capitol busy keeping us off of their airwaves, and Plutarch lead Finnick off for a chat, probably to see if he had any more stories. They were just a few feet away. I was then left with Haymitch and Katniss in the middle of the room, wondering if Finnick's fate would have one day been mine. With more than just Seneca. Why not? Snow could have gotten a really good price for the Girl on Fire.

"Is that what happened to you?" I asked Haymitch.

"No. My mother and younger brother. My girl," Haymitch said. So he had been dating someone... "They were all dead two weeks after I was crowned Victor. Because of that stunt I pulled with the force field."

At least I got to live after I had embarrassed the Capitol. "I'm sorry, Haymitch," I said.

"It's over with," Haymitch said, shrugging his shoulders. "After that, Snow had no one to use against me."

"I'm surprised he didn't just kill you," I said.

"Oh, no. I was the example. The person to hold up to the young Finnick's and Johanna's and Cashmere's. And you," Haymitch said. Of course. Snow had threatened me with exactly what had happened to Haymitch. "Of what could happen to a Victor who caused problems. But he knew he had no leverage against me."

"Until Peeta and I came along," I said softly. "Then Cato."

As usual, Haymitch didn't dare respond to me. Not the second that we were getting emotional. He, like me, didn't like having the hard talks. Just like normal, I didn't even get a shrug in return. I wanted to say something more to him, but I didn't know what there was to say. I also really wanted the Hadley's to stop staring at me, but I knew that they wouldn't. They were sure to ask me all about Seneca later. I also wanted to find him, but I needed to see the rescue. He would be a battle for another day.

My gaze turned back towards the screen as I tried to figure out what was happening. Nothing made sense. Cato should have been right behind that door. We knew where Cato was supposed to be. Right in that room. But it looked like they were in a lab. Not a prisoner's cell. The lights were bouncing off of what appeared to be serums that were sitting all around the room. Lots of medical devices, but Cato was nowhere to be found.

"What is this place?" Boggs asked.

Their lights from the flashlights were shining all over the room. They continued to look around the room, getting closer and closer to the back, still without a sign of Cato. Was there a chance that we had the wrong information about where Cato was? Could it have been a lie fed to us? Was that a chance that they were walking into a trap? Just as I opened my mouth to say something, there was a flash of light and the signal went out. The screen faded to black.

Everyone began banging on buttons as I desperately jumped forward. "Beetee?" I asked, my voice strained.

"I'm losing them," Beetee said.

"What's happening?" I breathed.

"Powering back up," Coin said, leaning down next to Beetee's computer.

"Ma'am, the Capitol air defense system is rebooting. It's coming back online," one of the system operators said.

"Must be diverting power from another source and filtering transmissions," Beetee said, still banging on the buttons. "Another sixty seconds and we'll be cut off."

"Madam President, should we call back the hovercraft?" the systems operator asked.

Were they nuts? They were already in there. If they left, the Capitol would realize how close we were to getting him. They would kill him immediately. "If we call them back, it's all over. We'll never get Cato back," I said loudly.

"There's gotta be something else that we can do," Katniss said.

How could we get them to pay attention to us and not the ones already in the Capitol? "Broadcast me," I said suddenly. Beetee and Coin turned back to me in surprise. "If Snow's watching this, maybe he'll let the signal in if he sees me. Put me on the air so he can see me."

"Yes. Yes," Plutarch agreed.

"Put her on," Coin ordered.

"Can we do this? Can we still get in?" Haymitch asked, darting over and grabbing one of the microphones that was sitting on the desk.

"Yes, for the moment he line's open. He will only see you," Beetee said.

Everyone jumped out of their chairs to ensure that I was the only person who would be seen. Katniss grabbed my arm quickly and gave it a reassuring squeeze. The Hadley's all nodded at me as they walked off to the side of the room. Haymitch was raising the microphone so that it would face me and pick up anything that I was saying. He was quickly turning the bolt in place as I tried to think of what I could say. I guessed that it would come to me when it was time.

"Okay, Aspen, go," Haymitch said, stepping out of my way.

First thing was getting Snow to talk to me. "President Snow? President Snow, it's Aspen," I called out.

"There's no guarantee he's even watching," Coin whispered, standing next to Plutarch.

"President Snow?" I repeated.

"I know, but he might be," Plutarch whispered back.

"President Snow, I need to speak with you. Are you there? President Snow, it's Aspen. Can you hear me? I need to speak with you," I continued. He had to be there... "President Snow, it's Aspen. President Snow, are you there? Can you hear me?"

He had to have been listening. There was no way that he hadn't been listening to Finnick and Seneca recount his entire life and all of his crimes. He must have just been waiting to see how desperate I was to speak with him. But still... there was no answer and the monitors showed no sign of changing from their static-filled broadcast. With still no response from him, I looked over at Coin and Plutarch for a moment. They nodded at me to keep trying.

"President Snow..." I tried again.

Just as I was about to repeat that I needed to talk to him, we heard a very distorted version of his voice. "Miss Antaeus." The screen slowly faded to reveal Snow sitting in his blood-red suit. "What an honor," Snow said, grinning.

Once he had appeared on the screen, I spent a few seconds just staring at him. He looked the same as he had the last time that I had seen him. Perhaps a little thinner and paler, but otherwise just the same. It was his words that kept thrashing around in my head. Telling me that it was an honor. It was the same thing that I had told him when he had visited my home in Victor's Village the day that the Victory Tour had started. Even now, he was still mocking me.

"I don't imagine you're calling to thank me for the roses," Snow said gleefully.

What do I say? What do I say? Anything that bides them time. "I never asked for this," I finally said. He needed to know that I really hadn't wanted this. Never. "I never asked to be in the Games."

Technically I had actually asked to be in the Games. But the only reason that I had volunteered was because Prim had been Reaped into the Games and I couldn't stand to have Katniss go in. Even if it had been her, I feared that the same thing would have happened. Katniss and I were that similar. And even if it hadn't been either one of us, it would have happened someday. He just needed to know that I didn't want this war. At least, I didn't want to be the one running it.

"Boggs?" Beetee called into the radio quietly. "Come in, Boggs."

"I never asked to be the Mockingjay. I just wanted to save my sisters and keep Cato alive," I said truthfully. "I didn't want to turn into my parents."

"And you haven't, as you're still alive," Snow said.

"Not by your choice," I pointed out.

Snow smiled again. "No, Miss Antaeus, not by my choice at all."

"Come in, Boggs," Beetee repeated.

"Please, just let him go and I will stop being the Mockingjay, I will disappear. You will never have to see me ever again," I said half-truthfully. I wouldn't stop being the Mockingjay, but one day I really would disappear for good. I was sick of being in the spotlight. "I swear to you. We'll leave. We'll leave Panem for good."

"Miss Antaeus," Snow began, grinning.

"Boggs, come in. Can you hear me?" Beetee continued in the background.

"You couldn't run from this..." Snow said.

"Copy," Boggs answered.

Beetee gave an okay symbol to the others. It was almost impossible not to let out a breath of relief. They were still alive. "... any more than you could have run from the Games," Snow finished.

"Command, I need a situation report," Boggs said over the radio.

"Boggs, we're running out of time. Hurry," Beetee whispered.

"Let's move," Boggs's voice came, obviously to his team.

"Please," I begged Snow, knowing that I had to speak before he got suspicious. "I never tried to run from the Games. Maybe I should have. Maybe it wasn't worth the fight." Snow gave me another small smile. "But you've won. You've already beaten me. Release Cato and take me instead."

It was me who he wanted. He would likely execute me the moment that he got his hands on me, but it would be worth it. Snow smiled again. "We're long past the opportunity for noble sacrifice," he said.

"Then tell me what to do. I've always kept my promises, haven't I?" I snarled.

"You said you didn't want a war, and that's just what's happened," Snow said.

"I didn't ask for this war."

"Perhaps not, but you were also unable to stop it," Snow said. But I had tried so hard to stop it. "I told you what a fragile thing peace was. And still, like a child, you took pleasure in breaking it."

"Do I look pleased right now?" I asked.

This was about as far from pleasing as I could possibly get. "Of course not, because you know that you're losing," Snow pointed out. Not after today. "I know what you are. I know you can't see past your narrowest concerns. But please, Miss Antaeus, I doubt you know what honesty is anymore."

"Maybe not," I said. "But I will keep my word on this. Make the trade. My life for Cato's. Please."

"Oh, Miss Antaeus. We don't trade lives in the Capitol. Not even yours," Snow said.

"Command, we're at the first target. Preparing to extract Cato," Boggs's voice came. Once more, it was nearly impossible to keep myself from shouting with glee. "Will confirm when he's in hand."

"Mockingjay One, prepare hovercraft for evac," Beetee said.

"You asked me to convince you that I was in love with Cato. Haven't I at least done that?" I asked.

"Miss Antaeus, it is the things we love most that destroy us. I want you to remember that I said that," Snow said. What the hell was that supposed to mean? A wicked grin spread over Snow's face. "Don't you think I know your friends are in the Tribute Center?" He turned to someone off-camera. "Cut them off."

It took me about three seconds too long to realize what he had just said. Snow knew that they were in the Tribute Center. He had just been entertaining me. He knew that I was trying to distract him. He had known the entire thing. My heart slammed against my ribs as I stumbled back from where I was standing. Suddenly the screen went back to static as my head whipped back and forth. A scream was lodged in my throat. Carrie was already screaming, only stopped by Damien pushing her head into his shoulder.

"What happened?" I gasped loudly.

"Boggs, come in," Beetee said.

"What happened?" I repeated.

"Boggs, come in. Do you read me?" Beetee asked.

The entire thing was a lie. He knew what he was doing. He knew that he was fooling me. He knew that he was wasting my time, leading all of us into a trap. Carrie was sobbing hysterically into Damien's shoulder. Alana was sobbing softly, keeping Aidan pressed against her chest. He looked like he was about to try and make a break for it. Julie was staring at the screen numbly. I turned on my heel and ran up to Haymitch with Katniss right behind me.

"He knows that they're in there. It's a trap," I said.

"Aspen, hold it," Haymitch said, grabbing my shoulders.

"We have to get a hold of them. We have to tell them to get out, he knows," I begged.

"There's no signal. We can't contact them," Plutarch said.

This was slowly turning into my worst nightmare. Losing most of the people that I cared about while they were trying to do something for me. How many people were about to die? Skye, Dean, Boggs, and the rest of those men. I didn't even know all of their names. Gale was there. My best friend went there and I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye to him. Cato was there. All of this hadn't happened to him just to die right when they were trying to rescue him. Tears began flooding my face.

"No!" I gasped, hysteria spilling over. "Haymitch, he knew the whole time. He was taunting me! No, Haymitch. They're in there. They're going to cut them off! They're going to kill them!"

"No, we don't know that. We don't know," Haymitch said loudly, trying to speak over me.

Just as Finnick and I had both done when the Mockingjay's had attacked during the Quell, Katniss dropped down to her hands and knees, placing them over her ears, trying to block out... my hysterical screams? Her own thoughts? The sounds of the others trying to get the broadcast back? I couldn't be sure. To keep me from completely losing it, Haymitch wrapped his arms around me and brought me into a hug as I sobbed hysterically, losing all grip on reality.

"Did I lose them both tonight?" I screamed, finally realizing just what was happening. "Did I lose them both tonight? Did I lose them both tonight?"

"Shh. It's okay," Haymitch whispered, running a hand through my hair.

"Did I lose them? I lost them both," I shrieked, trembling head to toe.

"Shh," Haymitch whispered.

"No! No!" I shouted.

My screams echoed all throughout Command. It didn't take long for Coin to order Haymitch to take me from the room. I tried to fight as they dragged me down to the hospital to give me a mild sedative. It didn't knock me out but it did calm me down enough to stop my hysteria. It took almost an hour for them to calm me down enough to realize that there was nothing that I could do right now. I had done everything I could. The rest of it would be up to them - including their survival.

It helped that the sedative put me in an almost trance. I could feel the terrified version of myself trapped right below the surface, but it couldn't escape. Likely just what the sedative had been given to me for. All I knew was that Katniss and the Hadley's stayed with me while I waited. Finnick did as well. I had a feeling that Seneca had been advised to stay in his quarters. I sat in a near catatonic state as the sedative wore off with the others trying to keep me calm.

Eventually I couldn't sit there anymore. I had to get up and do something. Anything to get my mind off of what might have been happening. They tried to get me to go to sleep, but I couldn't. With our job done, there was nothing left for Finnick and me to do but wait. We tried to fill the dragging minutes in Special Defense. The two of us tied knots for a while. The fact that we were making knots unnerved the doctors who were watching us and they quickly took the rope away, urging us to eat.

All that resulted in was the two of us pushing our lunch around our bowls. Afterwards we went to blow things up on the shooting range. No one was any use down there. We were all too shaky from the broadcast to actually be able to hit our targets. I missed each time, hitting the walls a few times. After I blew up the far wing of a hovercraft that wasn't even sitting on the firing range, I had been asked to hang up my bow and do something a little less dangerous.

Because of the danger of detection on their way back, no communication came from the rescue team. At 15:00, the designated hour, we stood tense and silent in the back of a room full of screens and computers and watched Beetee and his team try to dominate the airwaves. If they had actually made it out of the Capitol, it would have been right around then. That was when they were supposed to be leaving with Cato. Did they have him? Were they all dead already? In a fight at this very moment?

Beetee's usual fidgety distraction was replaced with a determination I had never seen. If there was ever a time for him to be so focused, it was now. I had never been more grateful for it. Most of my interview didn't make the cut, just enough to show that I was alive and still defiant. My declaration of freedom was some of the little that had made it. Instead it was Finnick and Seneca's salacious and gory account of the Capitol that took the day.

Was Beetee's skill improving? Or were his counterparts in the Capitol a little too fascinated to want to tune Finnick and Seneca out? Perhaps a little bit of both. For the next sixty minutes, the Capitol feed alternated between the standard afternoon newscasts, Finnick, and attempts to black it all out. But the rebel techno team managed to override even the latter and, in a real coup, kept control for almost the entire attack on Snow. If they had made it past Snow's team, they were on their way back.

"Let it go!" Beetee called, throwing up his hands, relinquishing the broadcast back to the Capitol. He mopped his face with a cloth. "If they're not out of there by now, they're all dead."

My entire body straightened. I grasped onto Finnick's hands. Katniss let out a slight sob. She came to stand at my other side, wrapping her arm around my waist. Most of the Hadley's seemed to be on the verge of the same hysteria that I felt. Beetee spun in his chair to see Finnick and me reacting to his words. He clearly noticed that the both of us were about to lose it. His face softened slightly. He knew that it had been a mistake to say that.

"It was a good plan, though. Did Plutarch show it to you?" Beetee asked us.

Of course not. Beetee took us to another room and showed us how the team, with the help of rebel insiders, would attempt - had attempted - to free the Victors from an underground prison. It seemed to have involved knockout gas distributed by the ventilation system, a power failure, the detonation of a bomb in a government building several miles from the prison, and now the disruption of the broadcast. Beetee was glad we found the plan hard to follow, because then our enemies would, too.

"Like your electricity trap in the arena?" I asked.

"Exactly. And see how well that worked out?" Beetee said.

Well... not really, I thought. I had been completely thrown during the entire plan. It had resulted in me getting knocked out and having a nice concussion for almost two months. Plus the entire thing had been screwed up from the beginning. I had blown up the arena - which wasn't supposed to happen - and both Johanna and Cato were taken - also not something that was supposed to have happened. Beetee had been placed in a wheelchair. Chaff had been killed.

The plan hadn't gone well at all. My heart was starting to pick up pace again as the panic rose in me. That plan had been simple compared to this one and it hadn't gone well at all. What had happened to this one? Tears threatening to fall, I excused myself to go on a walk around the District. I wasn't sure how long passed, but no one tried to stop me or speak to me as I walked, desperate to calm myself down. Everyone knew how stressed I was right now. Everyone knew how fragile I was.

Eventually I headed towards the dining room. It was the one place where I knew that no one would talk to me. It was the one place where I knew that I could be alone. I wasn't sure how long passed, but with the nightmares that kept creeping into my mind over what was happening, I began to sob. The tears were silent, but they never seemed to stop. Gale and Cato. Dean and Skye. All dead. All because of me. What felt like hours later, Coin appeared on my side and took a seat next to me.

"There's no news." I sniffled softly. "I'm sorry. It's the worst torture in the world. Waiting, when you know there's nothing you can do. Especially for people like us. But whatever strength, courage, madness, keeps us going, you find it, at times like these."

Finally I turned to look at Coin as tears continued to roll down my face. I didn't know what she was telling me. Actually, I did know, but she had to have known that I didn't want to hear any of that right now. She had to have known just how pathetic and guilty I felt. Whether or not Cato was still alive. Dean, Skye, and Gale. All of the rest of them. What if they all died? There were already so many people's blood on my hands. How much more could one person take before they were permanently broken?

"You have it, soldier. It's what's kept you alive all this time. And it won't fail you now," Coin continued.

Unable to speak, I nodded as I continued to cry. I spent a long time in tears before Katniss finally came and sat with me. Neither one of us spoke. There wasn't anything that we could say. Not right now. There would be nothing to say until someone came back with news of what had happened to them. When I finally looked over at Katniss, I noticed that she too looked to be in tears. We sat together in silence, holding hands, trying to keep ourselves from crying even more. But it really didn't work well.

"Come on," I finally said, jumping to my feet. "I can't sit here anymore."

Katniss nodded and rose alongside me. "Let's find Finnick," she offered.

"Okay."

The two of us wandered the halls for a little while, searching for wherever Finnick had gone. I tried to find him in my old hiding spot - which I had shown him one day - but he wasn't there. After a little while I realized that he wasn't even in his barracks. He had gone somewhere that there would be first word of the rescue mission. Which, I realized, was Command. There was no communication with the rest of the team, but they were trying.

Once we finally found him, the two of us took our seats with him, doing nothing. He had gotten another few pieces of rope and handed them off to us. Katniss clearly had no idea how to use them, so the two of us went to showing her how to make the only knot that mattered right now. The noose; the exact one that I could feel tightening around my neck with each passing moment. How long would it be before it tightened to the point that I could no longer breathe?

Finnick, Katniss, and I tried to station ourselves in Command, where surely first word of the rescue would come, but we were barred because serious war business was being carried out. The three of us were kicked out but we refused to return to the barracks. I needed to know what had happened, the moment that everyone else knew. So we refused to leave Special Defense and ended up being allowed to wait in the hummingbird room for news. It wasn't as peaceful as I remembered in there.

The three of us spent the remaining time that we had in the hummingbird room doing anything that we could think of to keep our minds off of what was happening elsewhere. So we went to the only things that our fragile minds could keep up with right now. Making knots. Making knots. No word. Not even after hours had passed. Making knots. Tick-tock. This was a clock. With the hands ticking away the minutes of our lives - just as it had done in the arena.

Do not think of Gale. Do not think of Cato. Making knots. The noose; over and over again. When the time came, we were quick to say that we did not want dinner. My fingers were raw and bleeding. Finnick finally gave up and assumed the hunched position he took in the arena when the Jabberjay's attacked. Katniss sat with her head tucked down into her knees. Her hands were so tight around the noose that her fingers were starting to turn purple. She was mumbling nonsensical words under her breath.

After a while I finally managed to perfect my miniature noose. Tying all of the strings together, I managed to make one large enough to strangle myself with. It took all of my strength to keep myself from doing that. He would be back. Both of them would be back. Do not think of Cato. Do not think of Gale. The words of 'The Hanging Tree' replayed in my head, along with Snow's warning. It is the things we love the most that destroy us. Gale and Cato. Cato and Gale.

Yes, I loved them both more than anything. And not having them here would certainly destroy me. I tried so hard to fight back the tears that were threatening to fall the entire time that the three of us were together. I was sure that I was going to lose it at any given point, but I had slipped into the territory of just being numb for now. I would not allow myself to feel anything or fall apart at the seams until I knew what had happened. There was no point. Not now. I could only wait.

Eventually I assumed the same position that Katniss and Finnick had taken - knees tucked up to my chest with my head in them. I tried so hard to remember all of the good times that I had ever had with both Cato and Gale. There were enough to fill a lifetime. But I wasn't done with them. Not yet. I sobbed softly, knowing that I couldn't live without either one of them. I didn't even talk to Gale before he left. We had been so angry with each other...

"Did you love Annie right away, Finnick?" I asked, desperate to shatter the silence.

"No." A long time passed before he added, "She crept up on me."

Could Gale have crept up on me? I wasn't sure. The only thing that mattered was that he came back. He was still one of the most important people in my life. I needed him back. As for Cato, he had definitely crept up on me during my time in the Capitol. But we had always had the Games to tie us. What about when all of this was over? I knew Gale completely. I had only known Cato during the Games. I searched my heart, but at the moment the only person I could feel creeping up on me was Snow.

The clock ticked away the minutes and hours, just the way that it had done in the arena. Just as I had felt my life ending in the arena, or at least, I had thought that it had been coming to an end, I felt theirs ending right now. With each ring of the new hour, I realized how much closer we were coming to the truth. The end of my life with the both of them. It must have been midnight, it must have been tomorrow when Haymitch pushed open the door.

All of our heads snapped up as I braced myself the news that they were dead. "They're back. We're wanted in the hospital."

It took a few times for me to realize what it was that Haymitch had said. It didn't make sense. The words that had come out of his mouth didn't make sense to me. There was no way. They were actually back? All of them? Had no one died? And the most important part, was Cato still alive? Had they actually managed to get him back? Was I finally going to get my husband back? I tried to rise to my feet, but a second later I collapsed back onto the bed.

My mouth opened with a flood of questions that he cut off with, "That's all I know."

"Cato's family?" I whispered.

"On their way. Come on," Haymitch said.

But I couldn't manage it, no matter how hard I tried. "Get up, Aspen," Katniss said, rising to her feet. She grabbed onto my arms, tugging me along with her. "Let's go."

"Cat -"

"Up," Katniss interrupted me, knowing that I didn't really know what I wanted to say. "Now."

All I wanted to do was sprint faster than I ever had and crash into Cato, never daring to release him, but Finnick was acting so strange, as if he had lost the ability to move, so I took his hand and led him like a small child. Through Special Defense, into the elevator that went this way and that, and on to the hospital wing. The place was in an uproar, with doctors shouting orders and the wounded being wheeled through the halls in their beds. It was even worse than when I had arrived from the arena.

Once we had arrived into the hospital wing, I broke away from Finnick, Katniss, and Haymitch. The three of them were still following me, each of us trying to look for anyone whom we recognized. I began sprinting through the hospital. I could see Cato's family doing the same, but I blew past them. Somewhere Prim and Ms. Everdeen were likely also still around here somewhere too, but I didn't care. Right now the only person that mattered was him.

My head whipped back and forth while I tried to find them, but I couldn't. There were too many people. We were sideswiped by a gurney bearing an unconscious, emaciated young woman with a shaved head. Her flesh showed bruises and oozing scabs. There was something familiar, but for a moment I couldn't place it. Then it hit me. Johanna Mason. Who actually knew rebel secrets. At least the one about me. And this was how she had paid for it.

"I don't want that," Johanna snapped.

It looked like she was trying to pull out some syringes from her arm. "Johanna..." I whispered, meeting eyes with her.

She looked miserable. Of course, she always looked furious. But now was even stranger. Through a doorway, I caught a glimpse of Gale, stripped to the waist, perspiration streaming down his face as a doctor removed something from under his shoulder blade with a long pair of tweezers. Wounded, but alive. That made one of them. Both Katniss and I called his name and started toward him until a nurse pushed us back and shut us out. At least I knew that he was okay.

"Finnick!"

Something between a shriek and a cry of joy. My head whipped around to see what was happening. Was someone actually dying? I had thought that everything was just fine. They were all back here. A lovely if somewhat bedraggled young woman - dark tangled hair, sea green eyes - ran toward us in nothing but a sheet. She was a little bruised and she looked like she had run through the dirt lately, but otherwise she seemed perfectly healthy. The Capitol had clearly done very little to her.

"Finnick!"

Finnick's head turned to her, slowly at first. "Annie?" he asked, almost disbelievingly. "Annie!"

Knowing what this moment meant for him, I stepped off to the side. I would have wanted the same if it were Cato and I. And suddenly, it was as if there was no one in the world but those two, crashing through space to reach each other. They collided, which looked slightly painful, enfolded, lost their balance, and slammed against a wall, where they stayed. Clinging into one being. Indivisible. Just the way that I prayed would happen with Cato soon enough.

Who I still didn't know whether or not he was alive. A pang of jealousy hit me. One that was rather unexpected. For a moment it didn't even occur to me what the jealousy was for. It certainly wasn't for either Finnick or Annie but for their certainty. Yes, that was what it was. There was absolutely no doubt in either one of their eyes. No doubt who they loved. Not the slightest bit. And certainly no one seeing them could doubt their love. Not the way that they had always done with Cato and I.

"You're safe. You're safe," Finnick whispered to her.

Deciding to leave them to their reunion, I turned the other way, just in time to see the door that Gale had been pushed behind earlier open again. "Gale!" I shouted.

His gaze turned up towards me. He looked almost shocked to see that I was here. He looked even more confused to see that Katniss was right behind me. The two of us rushed over towards him with Haymitch just a few steps behind us. I was running so fast that I slammed into Gale. He grunted - likely in pain - but I didn't care. He was here, alive, and that was what mattered. He embraced me for a long moment before releasing me and wrapping his arms around Katniss.

"You're back," Katniss breathed.

"Thank god you're okay," I said, placing my hand on the side of his face.

"Are you okay?" Katniss asked.

There was something wrong. He was just staring at us. No emotion. He should have been thrilled, at least, happy to see us again. "What's wrong?" I asked.

"Gale?" Katniss asked.

"What? What is it?" I repeated.

My heart sank. Was he dead? Was Cato dead? Were they trying to soften the blow? "I don't get it. Every gun was back online and on us and we flew right past them. They let us go," Gale said lowly.

No... No, I finally had my answer. Cato was alive. They had gotten him out of there, alive. No one had been injured or killed. I supposed that wasn't true. Gale was sick. A few others were likely also injured. But that didn't matter. They were all back here and would heal. Cato was around here somewhere. Now that I had seen Gale and ensured that he was okay, I had to find him. I had to see him. I just... I didn't know. I just needed to see him for myself.

"It doesn't matter," I said breathlessly, laying my hand on his chest. "You're back and safe. That's all that matters."

Gale paused a moment, still looking unsure, before throwing his head back over his shoulder. "He's in there." I followed his gaze back towards the room that held my husband. "The gas we used on the guards knocked him out, too, but it's wearing off now. You should be there when he wakes up," Gale said.

For a moment the two of us just stared at each other. Whatever came next for the two of us could come on another day. There was no way that Gale was going to say anything about Cato right now. The two of us could figure things out some other time. Right now we could just be happy that we were all still alive. Katniss smiled and stepped back with Gale. She knew that this was something that I had to do on my own. I reached in to give hm another hug and wrap my arms around his waist.

"Thank you," I muttered into his chest. When I turned towards the room, I realized that Boggs was also standing there. "Thank you," I repeated to him.

He merely gave me the slightest nod, following me towards Cato's room. I wanted to sprint past them, knock everyone out of my way, and be the first to see him, but I knew that I needed to calm down. Having a panic attack right now would only sentence e to another few weeks in the hospital wing along with Cato. Although, we might both think that was a little funny. Boggs looked a little worse for wear but he was uninjured. Something that I was surprisingly glad to see.

"We got them all out. Except Enobaria," Boggs said. I shrugged. I didn't give a damn about her since she had tried to literally rip my throat out with her teeth. "But since she's from Two, we doubt she's being held anyway. Cato's at the end of the hall. The effects of the gas are just wearing off. You should be there when he wakes."

Cato.

His name echoed all over my brain. He was here. I was right about to see him. I grinned brightly. It was the first time that I had given a smile like that since finding out that I had been brought to Thirteen and he had been left for the Capitol. Now Cato was here. Alive and well - maybe not well but alive and here. Away from Snow. Safe. Here. With me. In a minute I could touch him. See his smile. Hear his laugh. Sleep in the same bed with him. Never be alone again.

Haymitch was grinning at me. "Come on, then," he said.

"Thank you!" I breathed, throwing myself onto him as well.

He laughed but brought me in for a hug anyways. Not that he had anything to do with it. Once I had released him, I saw that the rest of the Hadley family was waiting at the end of the hallway. They were just feet away from the door that Cato must have been sitting behind. Marley was nowhere to be found, but Carrie appeared to be glued at the hip to Dean, who looked tired but otherwise unharmed. Alana was hanging off of Damien, laughing hysterically. Aidan was grinning brightly.

Skye was being supported by Julie. She had a bloody lip but was still here. "Oh, Aspen," Alana gasped, releasing her husband and coming to embrace me.

"Have you seen him yet?" I asked.

"No. No one has seen him yet," Alana said.

"D - Do you want to go in there first?" I stuttered, knowing that it was the right thing to say, but so desperate that they would say no.

"No," Damien said, as if reading my mind.

My brow raised in curiosity. They didn't want to see him first? "You're the only one that he's going to want to see right now," Alana said, smiling brightly. "You need to be the first one that he see."

"You're his mother," I argued.

"You're his wife," Alana pointed out.

Once she stepped away from me, I darted over to pull Dean and Skye into hugs. They both smiled. "Go," Dean said, nudging me away from him. "He was pretty out of it when we pulled him out. He might be a little confused. Give him some time to figure everything out."

"Okay," I breathed.

"Go. Go see him," Carrie said.

"Go on. Time for you to see him," Katniss said, smiling softly.

To my surprise, even Brutus was there. "Go get him, kid," he said, smacking me on the back.

"Congratulations," a new voice said in my ear. "He's finally back."

To my surprise, it was Seneca. Of course he was here. He knew what it meant being here. He knew that someone might very well try to beat him to death. But he would have been here for me. Because he knew what this moment meant to me. I smiled at Seneca and jumped after him, enveloping him in a painful hug. The Hadley's were watching me carefully - Dean and Skye clearly still out of the loop - but they said nothing. No one would dare say anything to me right now.

"Thank you," I said, letting up my grip but still not dropping my arms from his shoulders. "For everything."

He smiled at me and nodded, shoving me away. Everyone wanted me to see him. So did I. I was light-headed with giddiness. It felt almost like I had a concussion all over again. What would I say to him? Oh, who cared what I said? Cato would be ecstatic no matter what I did. Which would likely be standing there, staring at him. He would probably be kissing me anyway. Trying so desperately to do something even more. Even if he had to physically throw the doctors out of the room himself.

Which was just fine with me. I wasn't sure how strong he was right now, but I didn't care. I would be perfectly happy to support him myself if I needed to. I wondered if it would feel like those last kisses on the beach in the arena, the ones that proved to me that Cato would always mean what Gale never could, the ones I hadn't dared let myself consider until this moment. Up until now, I had loved him, and that was all that mattered. I loved him so desperately. That was all that mattered.

Those kisses - and the ones that followed - were sure to be perfect. Those kisses would be just like the ones on the beach. The ones that were more intense than any of the other ones that we had shared. I wasn't sure why, but it didn't matter. Perhaps it had been because we were about to die. I wasn't sure. It didn't matter. One slight nudge from Katniss got me back into gear. I would have been standing here forever if it wasn't for her.

My friends and family smiled as I shoved everyone out of my way to burst through the door into Cato's room. He was awake already, sitting on the side of the bed, looking bewildered as a trio of doctors reassured him, flashed lights in his eyes, and checked his pulse. I was disappointed that mine was not the first face he saw when he woke, but he saw it now. His features registered disbelief and something more intense that I couldn't quite place. Desire? Desperation?

Haymitch was right behind me, motioning the doctors away. "Cato..." I breathed.

Cato straightened out slightly at my voice. Maybe he didn't even believe that it was me. As his eyes fully met mine I clasped my hand over my mouth. He looked terrible. Undoubtedly he had lost at least twenty pounds. Thirty-five at the most. He would have to be on a special diet for a while. There were deep bruises all around his eyes and cheeks - which were both sunken back into his head. There were cuts all along his face, over his eyebrows, and on his lips. Some were likely from his warning to Thirteen.

But all of those things could be fixed with time. "You're here..." I practically sobbed.

Surely he was feeling both desire and desperation, for he swept the doctors aside, leapt to his feet, and moved toward me at the same time that I rounded the table that he had been sitting on to see him. The both of us ran to meet each other, my arms extended to embrace him. Just touching him... that was all that I had wanted for so long. Now I finally got it. His hands were reaching for me, too, to caress my face, I thought.

The two of us stood only inches apart as I tried to wrap my arms back around his neck as they had done so many times before. My lips were just forming his name - and so many other things - when his fingers locked around my throat. At first I thought that maybe I was imagining it. Maybe something else was happening. Maybe he thought that this was a trick from the Capitol. I tried to open my mouth to reason with him that it really was me, but Cato was always much stronger than I gave him credit for.

Even now. His hands locked so tightly around my throat that I was unable to breathe as he shoved the both of us back into a glass care behind me, shattering it against my back. I felt the pricks from the shards but was unable to scream from the lack of breath. He pulled us back and shoved me down against one of the trays in the far corner of the room. Our momentum was so strong that it carried us over as we smacked onto the tile floor below. Cato rolled on top of me, pushing his fingers down into my throat.

"Cato!" Haymitch's voice called. "Cato! Get off! Get off of her!"

"Cato! Let go! It's Aspen!" Dean shouted.

From behind, Haymitch, Brutus, and Dean tried to grab him and pry him off of me. Haymitch's arms wrapped around Cato to drag him off of me, but his grip was so strong that he refused to release me, instead dragging me back to my feet. Cato threw a doctor back to his feet and shoved Haymitch back into one of the medical trays before reaching underneath my shoulder and slam me back down against the tile, throwing Dean and Brutus away from us.

His fingers were progressively getting tighter and tighter around my throat as my eyes began rolling back in my head. "Let go!" Haymitch shouted.

"Get off of her!" Brutus yelled.

"Cato, it's Aspen!" Dean barked.

Their voices began melding together as the three of them continued to pry Cato off of me. But they weren't working. Instead Cato's grip got tighter and tighter. I tried to kick him off of me, desperately praying that the entire thing was a dream, when my eyes began to roll back in my head and I began to pass out. It is the things we love most that destroy us. I could still hear Snow's laughter as Boggs brought down a tray over Cato's head, knocking him out. A moment later, I passed out alongside him.

Chapter 14: Chapter Fourteen

My eyes immediately sprang open, instantly flooded with the bright florescent lights of the hospital. At first, I thought that maybe I had just passed out. Maybe I had just had another realistic nightmare. But I quickly realized that something had happened. Something was wrong. There was a sharp stabbing pain on the right side of my chest and the pain only increased with each breath that I took, something that was as hard as it had been when I had run through the fire in the first Games. Each breath took almost everything in me to gather.

Something in my chest felt extremely tight and coughing did nothing more than worsen the pain. I tried to raise up out of the bed - quickly realizing that I was in a hospital gown - but I noticed that my torso was heavier than normal. Why? What had they done to me? My hands traveled desperately up my torso to reach for something hard and metallic that was resting against my throat. Fear coursing through my veins, I grasped at the metal, desperate to remove it. At that same moment, Boggs came dashing up to my side and pulled my hands away from the brace.

"No, Aspen," Boggs said reassuringly. My eyes widened for a moment until I realized that he really was trying to help me. "No, no, no. You're swollen. Don't touch it. No, no, no." I relaxed slightly, realizing that it was just a neck brace. But why was it on me? "Calm down. Calm down. You're okay."

Okay? I was okay? So why did it feel like I was about to have a heart attack? My heart was pounding so fast that I was sure that it was a heart attack coming to pay me a visit. My head turned as far to the right and left as it could go. Save Boggs and myself, there was only a nurse in the room. Where was everyone? Where were my friends? Where was my family? I wanted them here. And what the hell had happened to me? It was like someone had drawn a curtain on the past few hours of my life. I knew that there was a neck brace on me, but how had it gotten there? Was I really remembering things correctly?

Or had all of the stress finally gotten to me? It didn't seem likely, but my injuries were indicative that it had happened the way that I vaguely remembered. Did Cato really attack me? I couldn't be sure. Had I just been imagining things? Were my nightmares playing tricks on me? My head was spinning from my thoughts running rampant. It definitely felt like I had been strangled and had lost a fight with the Capitol trains. But the entire thing didn't make sense. Cato wouldn't have dared to try and hurt me the way that I thought that he had. Not after being rescued from the Capitol.

It didn't seem even close to being right. I knew Cato. I knew my husband. He had attacked a number of people before. Numerous kids and adults in the Games. But he had never attacked me. Not for anything. Other than the one brief slap under the influence of Tracker Jacker venom in the first Games we had never hurt each other. Not in the Games. Not even the many times that either one of us had threatened to kill each other. We would never attack the other. Maybe with words - we had done that a million times before - but never physically.

Something was very wrong here. Was I imagining things? Had we gone out on some mission and had I been badly injured? Perhaps I was making things up in my head. Perhaps Cato wasn't even back here yet. Maybe they had never gone on that mission to save him from the Capitol. Maybe I was just dreaming about the things that scared me the most in the entire world. But judging by the look on Boggs's face... No, I couldn't think of it yet. Boggs turned to the nurse standing at the door and nodded.

"Tell her she's awake," he commanded.

The nurse nodded and fled from the room. Boggs's hands were still wrapped around my wrist, probably trying to ensure that I wasn't about to rip the collar off, which I so desperately wanted to do. There was a monitor next to the bed that I was laying in that was beeping rather rapidly, matching my thumping heartbeat. Boggs didn't look like he was planning on moving anytime soon. So, I opened my mouth and tried to force words out of my mouth; Cato's name, more specifically. But all that I got was a slight hiss.

"Don't try to talk," Boggs said. I silenced myself immediately. "Cato's okay, I promise. I just had to get him off you."

For a moment I just stared at Boggs. It didn't make sense to me. At least, I didn't want it to make sense. All I knew was that it was truth. Cato really had attacked me. He really did come back from the Capitol. None of it had been a nightmare. At least, not one that I could wake up from. So that came down to why Cato had attacked me. Did he think that I was some creature made up by the Capitol? Did he think that I was a trick made by Snow? I wanted to ask a thousand questions, but my voice wasn't working and Boggs had ordered me not to speak.

"Wait here. We'll get everyone in here," Boggs said.

It turned out that waiting for Boggs wasn't just a few minutes. It was a process of near hours. Each hour getting even more distressing than the last. No one spoke to me. Not any of the doctors. They simply did what they needed to do and moved on, letting the next one take another look at my body and the damage that had been done by Cato. Only one of them reassured me that I was completely safe. Completely safe... words that I had heard a thousand times before. Words that never seemed to be completely true.

The cold collar chafed my neck and made the shivering even harder to control. There were no blankets on the bed that I was confined to. They couldn't put any extra weight on me until I was strong enough to make it. At least I was no longer in the claustrophobic tube, while the machines clicked and whirred around me, listening to a disembodied voice telling me to hold still while I tried to convince myself I could still breathe. It was stunningly difficult. Even now, when I had been assured there would be no permanent damage, I hungered for air.

It felt like someone had put a lead brick on my chest. No matter how deep of a breath I took, I couldn't completely fill my lungs. Without asking the doctors, they had assured me that it was completely normal, promising that I would be back to normal in no time. Evidently, they were unaware of how long it had been since I had felt normal. Far longer than I was comfortable with. How long had it been since I was that parent-less girl who had wandered into the Hob with her two best friends, just hoping to not starve to death and avoid the Games? I couldn't even remember.

The medical team's main concerns - damage to my spinal cord, airway, veins, and arteries - had been allayed. Bruising, hoarseness, the sore larynx, this strange little cough - not to be worried about. It would all be fine. The Mockingjay would not lose her voice. Where, I wanted to ask, was the doctor who determined if I was losing my mind? Only I still wasn't supposed to talk right now. I couldn't even thank Boggs when he came to check on me time and time again. To look me over and tell me he had seen a lot of worse injuries among the soldiers when they taught choke holds in training.

Everyone seemed so nonchalant about the fact that my husband had just tried to strangle me to death. Maybe he really had just been hallucinating or thought that I was some creature conjured up by the Capitol. I wanted so desperately to ask, but no one would tell me anything. All I knew was that there was definitely something wrong. I could tell by the way that the others were acting. Too normal. Too carefree. It was the way that someone acted before delivering bad news, as they were trying to cushion the blow of what was sure to be a kill shot.

It was Boggs who knocked out Cato with one blow before any permanent damage could be done. I knew Haymitch would have come to my defense if he hadn't been utterly unprepared. To catch both Haymitch and myself off guard was a rare thing. Not just him. Katniss, Dean, Brutus, and Damien had all also been there. None of whom were easy to catch off guard. None of whom had been expecting what had happened. None of whom had thought that the meeting would go the way that it had.

No one had been expecting anything to happen other than a kiss and perhaps a warning to wait until we were in private to continue our reunion. But we have been so consumed with saving Cato, so tortured by having him in the Capitol's hands, that the elation at having him back blinded us. Each and every one of us hadn't even thought about what could have happened. If I had had a private reunion with Cato, the one that I had so desperately wanted, he would have killed me. Now that he was deranged.

No, not deranged, I reminded myself. Hijacked. That was the word that I had heard passing between Plutarch and Haymitch as I was wheeled past them in the hallway. It was the word that I had heard a few others - including the doctors - say. It was the word that I was sure was destined to ruin my life. If it wasn't ruined already, at least. Perhaps ruined for the final time. Hijacked. The word repeated itself in my head over and over again the entire time that I was worked on. No matter how hard I thought about it, I didn't know what it meant.

Right now, it was the only thing that I wanted to know. Someone had to tell me what it meant. This wasn't something that I was going to let them hide from me. I tried to speak a number of times, but they kept telling me to be quiet. I imagined that it didn't really matter anyways. The one time that I had tried to say his name was useless. My voice was gone for now. But all I wanted was to ask them what it meant. Hijacked. What it meant for Cato and what it meant for me, but I was never able to get more than a pathetic hiss out before I was silenced.

Things were silent for a long time after the doctors had finished their check-up on me. It was almost strange. I didn't like it. Very slowly my family began to trickle into the room. They didn't speak but they did each give me their own little greetings. A squeeze of the shoulder. A pat on the knee. A kiss on the forehead. But I barely noticed who they all were. All I was concerned about right now - even more so than my own lack of oxygen - was Cato and what that word meant. Hijacked. What the hell could that even mean?

It wasn't long before everyone had showed up. All of Cato's family were quickly at my bedside, save Marley, who was likely being looked over by one of the older women. I was a little surprised that they weren't with him. Maybe they weren't allowed to be with him right now. Alana appeared to be more attentive than she had been in weeks. Damien stood with a tensely straightened spine. Carrie was clinging onto Dean, both of whom looked overly-concerned with me. Skye and Julie were snarling back and forth with the doctors to tell them what was wrong with Cato.

Of course, just like with me, they were ignoring the two girls. They weren't going to tell us what it meant until they were ready. If that day or time ever came. Even Brutus and Seneca were in the room right now. I was the slightest bit surprised to see that they were there. Especially Seneca, who I had thought would be on very thin ice with the residents of Thirteen right now. But with Cato's unexpected entrance into Thirteen, everyone had momentarily forgotten about the broadcast. For the first time ever, Brutus actually looked concerned for me.

Or perhaps it was for Cato, even if he wasn't here. I supposed that it didn't really matter. He was concerned and we both wanted to help the same person. That was what mattered. And we would eventually find them. I had faith in that. Katniss and Prim, who appeared moments after the attack and had stayed as close to me as possible ever since, spread another blanket over me. The doctors had finally agreed that it would be okay to give me a few of them. But it didn't matter. I was still freezing and likely would be until I was back to normal. If that was even possible.

"I think they'll take the collar off soon, Aspen. You won't be so cold then," Prim said reassuringly.

"Do you want some more blankets?" Katniss asked.

I continued to stare blankly at the ceiling. "Is there anything that we can get you?" Alana asked softly.

Once more I ignored them. Aidan took a seat on the edge of the bed, unfurling a paper napkin in his lap. "I got you some cookies," he whispered, just the way that Peeta's father had done after the Reaping of the first Games. "I don't think that you can have them just yet, but you should be able to eat them once you're better. Took a lot of convincing to get them for you."

Aidan, who had once hated me so much, was now one of the members of the Hadley family that cared the most for me. Right now, it seemed that he was the one who cared the most for me. Boggs took an extra napkin, folded the cookies up in it, and placed it on the edge of the bedside table. I couldn't even imagine where he had gotten them from, but I supposed that it didn't matter. What happened to Cato was what mattered. Aidan obviously understood that as he didn't mind that I gave almost no indication that I had noticed his gift.

All I wanted right now was to tell everyone to get away from me. There were far too many people with me in the room right now and I knew that I looked pathetic. Save the collar, I wasn't sure what else was making me look pathetic and hopeless, but I was sure that there was something. I was used to it by now. I just didn't want to be with them. I didn't want to be with anyone. The only thing that I wanted was for Cato to get back to normal. I wanted him to be here, with me, and not trying to kill me.

Ms. Everdeen, who had been assisting in a complicated surgery, had still not been informed of Cato's assault. Probably for the best. For now, she was the only person missing. Prim took one of my hands, Katniss taking the other, both of which were clutched in fists, and massaged them until they opened and blood began to flow through my fingers again. Katniss was still working on the second fist when the doctors showed up, removed the first collar, replacing it with a second, less sturdy one, and gave me a shot of something for pain and swelling.

It was definitely easier to move around and my swallowing didn't seem quite as difficult as it was before, but the collar definitely didn't feel right. I wanted it off, but I knew that there would be no arguing against it. For now, I was stuck, useless, bedridden, and mute. Although there was only one thing that I wanted to know and I was sure that the doctors already knew what I wanted to know. So I laid, as instructed, with my head still, not aggravating the injuries to my neck, which would apparently be healed in a few weeks.

Plutarch, Haymitch, and Beetee had been waiting in the hall for the doctors to give them clearance to see me. I didn't know if they had told Gale, who had gone to immediate emergency surgery after seeing me and showing me where Cato was, but since he wasn't here, I assumed they hadn't. Perhaps they wouldn't tell him. That would probably be for the better, considering that he might try and attack Cato himself for it. Plutarch ushered the doctors out and tried to order Prim, Katniss, and the kids to go as well, but an argument quickly ensued.

"No," Prim snapped, surprising me. I would have thought that Katniss, Dean, Skye, or Julie would speak first. Not Prim. "If you force me, or any of us, to leave, I'll go directly to surgery and tell my mother everything that's happened. And I warn you, she doesn't think much of a Gamemaker calling the shots on Aspen's life. Especially when you've taken such poor care of her."

Plutarch looked offended, but Haymitch chuckled. "I'd let it go, Plutarch," Haymitch said.

Without further argument, Prim was allowed to stay. The only person who had been told that they couldn't come in was Marley. She was clearly far too young to be in here. They didn't want Aidan in here either, but if Prim was allowed to stay, so was he. I could tell that they really wanted to remove Cato's family - who were clearly as bewildered and upset about this as I was - but each one had refused to leave. Particularly Damien and Alana, whose faces I couldn't really read. At least, not Damien's. Alana was clearly hanging by a thread. Just the way that I was.

For a little while everyone was silent as they did some last-minute checks. Making sure that I was alright. Letting Cato's family know that he was okay. Definitely not exactly well, but not dead either. Also, not deranged. I kept wondering what it meant. Hijacked. It obviously wasn't just me. It was pretty clear that Cato's family was going to lose it if they didn't know what had happened within a few minutes. Plutarch sat in a chair on the other end of the room, rubbing a hand over his face, clearly very stressed.

"So, Aspen, Cato's condition has come as a shock to all of us. We couldn't help but notice his deterioration in the last two interviews," Plutarch said. How could you have possibly missed it? He had looked terrible for weeks. "Obviously, he'd been abused, and we put his psychological state down to that. Now we believe something more was going on."

"Obviously something more has been going on!" Alana shouted hysterically, startling me.

Everyone else, too, seeing as they all jumped. Even Plutarch looked shocked. "Mrs. Hadley -"

"Don't you dare say anything to me," Alana interrupted. It was that moment that I really saw the similarities between her and her son. That fierce anger whenever they were triggered by something. "I want to know what the hell happened to my son when he was in the Capitol."

"We're getting there," Plutarch said calmly.

"You should have been there weeks ago! Before he got to this point!" Alana howled.

"Darling -" Damien started.

Alana wanted to hear from her husband about as much as she wanted to hear Plutarch reason why it wasn't their fault that Cato was at this point. "Our son is... I don't know!" Alana shouted, fed-up. "I don't know what's wrong with him, but I want to know. I want to know why the hell he got to this point. I want to know why my son just tried to kill my daughter-in-law."

Her voice was rattling with fury as tears built up in my eyes. "Mom, stop," Dean whispered.

He was speaking very softly, a strange contrast to Alana's rattling snarls. I noticed Dean was shaking his head softly, motioning over to me. I tried to look away. This was my fault. Why did I deserve their pity? Their son and brother was out of his mind and the family still clearly felt badly for me. How did that make any reasonable sense? Maybe it was because Dean could obviously see that I was about to cry, thinking about what my husband was going through. My husband, who hated my guts. Alana let out a breath that seemed to calm her slightly.

She took a seat at the edge of my bed, grabbing my hand comfortingly. I wanted to pull away, but I didn't. I would have liked to be left alone, but I knew that this wasn't just about me. It was also about them. He wasn't just my husband. He was also their family member. They had known him a lot longer than I had. That didn't stop a few tears from leaking out of my eyes. This was not the reunion that I had wanted. I wanted to be in bed with him right now. Not in the hospital, laid up in bed, because he had put me there.

Katniss took the opposite end of the bed with Prim and grabbed my hand. "Okay, we've all made mistakes here. The important thing is that we figure out what comes next," Katniss said calmly.

When had she become the calming force here? She was normally the most hot-headed of us. "Was he just panicked at seeing her? Did he think that she was an illusion created by the Capitol?" Damien asked.

A reasonable question. A question that almost made a brilliant grin cross my face. Yes. That would have been wonderful. I could have kissed Damien for asking that. Of course! Cato didn't really hate me. He had been so tormented by the Capitol, and he had been passed out during the rescue, that no one had gotten a chance to explain to him that he was safe. He must have thought that I was a new form of torture brought on by the Capitol. But before I could get too excited, Beetee's tiny shake of the head brought my entire world down.

"No. It's almost definitely positive that Cato knew who Aspen was. He knew that she was real," he said.

I'd had a fireball sear through my stomach before. This was a worse pain. "So, let's repeat the prior question. Why the hell did my son attack my daughter-in-law? He should have been thrilled to see her," Alana pointed out.

"Yes, he should have," Plutarch agreed.

"So, what happened?" Dean asked.

"How do we fix this?" Alana added.

Plutarch sucked in another breath. "That the Capitol has been subjecting him to a rather uncommon technique known as hijacking. Beetee?" he asked, passing off the explanation to him.

"That is?" Alana asked, since I couldn't.

"I'm sorry, but I can't tell you all the specifics of it, Aspen. The Capitol's very secretive about this form of torture, and I believe the results are inconsistent. This we do know. It's a type of fear conditioning. The term hijack comes from an old English word that means 'to capture,' or even better, 'seize.' We believe it was chosen because the technique involves the use of Tracker Jacker venom, and the jack suggested hijack. You were stung in your first Hunger Games, so unlike most of us, you have firsthand knowledge of the effects of the venom," Beetee said.

Terror. Hallucinations. Nightmarish visions of losing those I loved. Because the venom targeted the part of the brain that housed fear. Somehow, I could remember the entire thing. The world floating in and out of my vision. That horrible spinning that had caused me to fall from the tree. Stumbling out to the lake to remove the stingers. Seeing Seneca in the woods. The foul-smelling green liquid that had come out of the large wounds. The kaleidoscope of colors. Stumbling around. Seeing Glimmer's bloated and green-oozing body. Breaking her fingers with the rocks.

Had I really done that? It felt like that memory was in a blender. Glimmer's skin had disintegrated in my hands. Confused over the hovercraft that I had thought was coming for me. The slime on the arrows. Seeing Caesar Flickerman speaking to me about the Tracker Jackers. Cato's changing eye colors. The wolf paw prints in the dirt. Stumbling into the trees as the world shifted around me. The house-sized butterfly exploding. Trees bursting into blood. The ants boring into my eyes and skin. Falling into the orange bubbles. That far-off scream. Yes. It had been a living nightmare.

One that I had lived trapped in for days. Seneca suddenly appeared in the door frame. I let out a breath of relief, reaching out for him. "I am aware of this type of fear conditioning," Seneca said slowly. He took a step near me, but backed off as Alana took a protective stance in front of me. She was obviously caught up on his announcement of what had happened between us. "It's... brutal, to be put nicely."

Knowing what the Tracker Jacker venom had done to me set my teeth on edge. If that had happened to me with just a few stings, what had happened to Cato with weeks of it? "What the hell have your people done to my son?" Alana snarled at Seneca.

"They're not my people. I've been with the rebellion for some time," Seneca explained calmly. "They've put him through the process of hijacking. It's not easy and takes time. With all of the weeks that he's been in the Capitol, they've had plenty of time to work through the deepest parts of the process."

"Did you know?" she hissed.

"Of course not. I would have never let this happen," Seneca said defensively.

And I believed him. He cared for me enough to have never let this happen. "I don't trust you. Tell me something. How many of my family members do you have to kill or hurt?" Alana asked. Tears formed in my eyes. "My daughter! My son!"

Actual hurt shot through his eyes. "I've never meant to hurt any of you," Seneca said.

"Perhaps you should leave," Boggs suggested to Seneca softly.

Seneca nodded his consent. "Yes. I should."

But I didn't want him to go. He was actually one of the few people who I wanted here right now. So I began shaking my head desperately since I evidently still wasn't allowed to talk. The last thing that I wanted was for Seneca to leave. They could grant me that much, right? I reached out and grabbed his hands to try and keep him near my bed, accidentally drawing him closer to Alana. She looked furious to have him near either one of us. My actions clearly weren't sitting well with her, considering that she was nearly out of her mind right now.

"Calm down," Damien told his wife softly. "Getting angry isn't making things better."

"You think I don't have a right to be angry?" she spat at him.

It was definitely the angriest that I had ever seen her. To my surprise, Carrie stepped in between them. "I don't think anyone has a right to be angrier than Aspen right now," she said quietly but still stern.

"I think that Aspen should have a right to speak for herself," Skye interrupted angrily.

Unfortunately, Aspen can't speak for herself right now. "Maybe she'd be able to if Cato hadn't just tried to kill her because the people in the Capitol tortured him!" Alana shouted, echoing my thoughts.

"Enough!" Katniss shouted, her voice nearly rattling the room, surprising everyone. "Regardless of what we all now know happened between them, Seneca cares for Aspen - and Cato, in turn. He would have never let this happen. To either one of them."

The room plunged into a slightly awkward silence as I smiled at Katniss as best as I could. She squeezed my hand. "Thank you, Katniss," Seneca said, breaking the silence.

She nodded. "Back to what happened, please," Plutarch said.

"I'm sure you remember how frightening it was. Did you also suffer mental confusion in the aftermath? A sense of being unable to judge what was true and what was false?" Beetee asked. "Most people who have been stung and lived to tell about it report something of the kind."

My heart skipped a beat. Yes. That encounter with Peeta. Even after I was clearheaded, I wasn't sure if he had saved my life by taking on Cato or if I had imagined it. Even the argument with Cato had been unclear. I wasn't sure if it had really happened. The only proof had been my sore jaw from his hit. Finch and Rue had both confirmed the argument afterwards. But when I had first woken up... I hadn't been sure if either one of those things had really happened. In fact, it was during the Victory Ceremony that I really got to see what had happened. That was mostly where my memory came from.

"Recall is made more difficult because memories can be changed." Beetee tapped his forehead. "Brought to the forefront of your mind, altered, and saved again in the revised form. Now imagine that I ask you to remember something - either with a verbal suggestion or by making you watch a tape of the event - and while that experience is refreshed, I give you a dose of Tracker Jacker venom. Not enough to induce a three-day blackout. Just enough to infuse the memory with fear and doubt. And that's what your brain puts in long-term storage. The venom puts the subject in a disassociate state. And they torture him with shocks and beatings and strip down his identity. And then all of that suffering and fear is redirected, associated with other memories or a person."

Beetee's words echoed in my head for at least a few minutes. I started to feel sick as the truth of it all sank in. I knew what it was like to have the Tracker Jacker venom echoing through my veins. I knew what it did to someone. I knew the feeling of horror and terror that it sent through someone. The memories would likely be easy enough to change with enough venom. What were they using? Videos from the Games? The Victory Tour? All of those already brutal memories distorted to make me look like the bad guy.

All of those memories of the two of us having been changed. All of those memories being changed to something even scarier than the original, this time with me at the center of them. All of the torture that they had put Cato through, only to infuse him with false memories of me. Enough to make him want to attack me. All of that terror and pain that he had experienced was now redirected onto me. My heart sank down to the floor and even further than that, if it was at all possible. I wanted to scream but that was out of the question right now.

"Are you kidding?" Alana finally asked.

"No, he's not," Seneca said.

"That's all the information that we have on it?" Brutus asked. Even he looked horrified.

"The exact process is vague. I know that a certain memory is first called to the front of the mind by some type of stimulus. Words and images associated with the desired memory can be used; in Cato's case, likely what's happened is that recordings of events in the arena, both times around, were utilized when possible. Once Cato had remembered the event, the Tracker Jacker venom was injected into the bloodstream. The quantity of venom was small enough that it caused almost no physical reaction - pain or swelling - and minimal hallucination. However, the memory is slightly altered by the hallucinatory effects and becomes subconsciously associated with fear and pain. The disorienting effects help to camouflage the falsity of the memories. Afterwards, the brain stores the memory in the new form, along with the negative associations," Seneca explained.

It was a lot of information to process at once and I was sure that everyone else felt that way. I tried to put together anything else that could have been happening, any other way to process what they were saying, but I knew that I was understanding things well enough. They had showed Cato videos of the Games and the Victory Tour and whatever they had in between. What we were seeing was the effects of the beatings and torture. But those ticks, the way that he had struggled to tell me about the attack on Thirteen, were all because of the Tracker Jacker venom.

If we had just been a few days earlier, we would have been better off. Cato was obviously having a problem telling whether or not I was good, but he was enough of himself to manage a warning. After that they must have worked on him nonstop to get him to the point that he was at now, enough so that if he saw me, he would instantly lunge. I wanted the words and explanation not to make sense. But it did, as much as I wished that it didn't. I didn't want it to be real. I wanted to be imagining this entire thing.

"It was that bad?" Skye asked weakly.

"Yes," Plutarch answered.

"You let this happen?" Julie hissed at Seneca.

Of course not. He would have never let this happen if he knew that it was hijacking. "No one knew what was happening to Cato when he was in the Capitol. We knew that things were bad but we never could have guessed that they were this bad. We never realized that they were doing this to him," Seneca explained as calmly as he could.

Everyone was silent for a moment before Skye breathed, "It's why they let him go in the Capitol."

"Likely, yes," Plutarch agreed.

I hadn't thought of that. They had wanted him to get away. He was their way of killing me. Alana started towards Seneca again. "If you had rescued him earlier -"
"Nothing would have been changed," Brutus interrupted, stepping forward and surprising me slightly. At least he agreed that this wasn't Seneca's fault. He would have done anything to stop this. "They were already going through with the hijacking process. It wouldn't have been to the point that it is now, but it still would have happened."

Alana stifled a sob. "You should have never left him in the Capitol," she growled.

"We're so sorry," Seneca said honestly. "We never -"

"Expected this to happen. So we've heard," Carrie interrupted coldly.

That plunged the room into another silence as we all stared at each other, wondering what came next. Prim finally asked the question that was in my mind. "Is that what they've done to Cato? Taken his memories of Aspen and distorted them so they're scary?"

Beetee nodded. "So scary that he'd see her as life-threatening. That he might try to kill her. Yes, that's our current theory."

"They turned him into a weapon, Aspen. To kill you," Haymitch said seriously.

His eyes were slightly red. As upset as I was with this, so was he. He cared about Cato too, as much as he didn't want to admit it. This was affecting him in a different way than me, but just as much. That was also the same time that the gravity of the situation hit me. If even Haymitch saw this as something dangerous and deadly, so did I. It was that look that Haymitch was giving me. It was the look that I had seen so many times before. The look that told me that this was dangerous and nothing could be changed.

It was already too late. We both knew that it was too late. The truth hit me like a ton of bricks. The truth of what had just happened and what we couldn't change. It was too late for us to change anything. But for this to have happened. Like this... When I had been so thrilled to finally have him back with me... I covered my face with my arms because this couldn't have been happening. It wasn't possible. There was no way. For someone to make Cato forget he loved me... no one could do that. Our love was too strong. We had promised it to each other countless times.

We had promised each other that we would always love each other. No one could ever change that and no one could ever mean to us what the other did. I began hyperventilating as I tried so desperately to think of anything that could be done to change what had happened to Cato. There had to be something that we could do to save him and bring him back to me. I needed him back. I had wanted it for so long. Now he was finally back and he wanted nothing more than to kill me. What kind of cruel change of fate was that?

"But you can reverse it, right?" Prim asked.

"Um... very little data on that," Plutarch said awkwardly. My heart sank. He might as well have just said what he was thinking. No. "None, really. If hijacking rehabilitation has been attempted before, we have no access to those records."

"Well, you're going to try, aren't you? You're not just going to lock him up in some padded room and leave him to suffer?" Prim persisted.

"If you do that -" Alana snarled.

"Of course, we'll try, Prim. Alana, we will not leave your son like this. You have our word," Beetee said, trying to calm Alana before she went off the rails again.

"And we all know how good that is," Alana hissed.

Obviously fed up with what was happening, Katniss stood from the bed and advanced on Beetee and Plutarch. "You're going to try. You're going to do anything possible to fix this. The only reason that he's like this is because you didn't go back for him in the arena. You owe it to Aspen - and the rest of us - to try anything possible to get him back to himself," Katniss hissed dangerously.

"We will try everything that we can," Beetee promised. I grabbed Katniss's wrist and pulled her back to me. "It's just, we don't know to what degree we'll succeed. If any. My guess is that fearful events are the hardest to root out. They're the ones we naturally remember the best, after all."

The room was silent for a while as everyone processed what was happening. The lack of faith in Beetee's voice... They could try as hard as they wanted, Cato would likely be stuck the way that he was forever. In some disturbed state trapped between reality and a horrific lie. Hating me. Wanting me dead. The tears built up in my eyes all over again. What could be done at this point? How could we make sure that he was going to be okay? What could I do to help him besides die? Probably nothing.

"Is he in pain?" Damien finally asked quietly.

"We don't think so. He's irate right now, trying to figure out what's happened and where he is. But we're hopeful that we can at least get him to a content space soon enough," Beetee said.

"I want to see him," Alana said suddenly.

She still hadn't seen him? "I'm afraid that we can't do that," Plutarch told her.

"He's my son!" Alana snapped.

Plutarch was obviously avoiding my eyes. "We can't accidentally trigger any memories that he might associate with Aspen. Right now, he will likely remember that you attended his wedding to Aspen or that you know her. Anyone that we can have speak with Cato has to be someone that he won't associate with her to keep from triggering memories," Plutarch explained.

His own family couldn't even see him because of me. What more could I possibly do to ruin their lives? "So, I can't even see my son?" Alana gasped.

"Perhaps once we've made some progress on him," Beetee said gently.

"Until then?" Carrie asked.

Would he really just be left alone all the time? He must have been beside himself right now. "He'll be treated by strangers and converse with them. No mentions of Aspen or any of your family," Plutarch said. He would have to be completely alone as he went through this... "This is going to have to go slowly. But we're confident that we'll make some progress."

"Aspen -" Alana started.

But I couldn't hear her right now. I didn't want to hear anything right now. Not from her. The only thing that I wanted to hear about right now was what we could possibly do to help Cato. I began shaking my head desperately, tears steadily flowing down my cheeks and onto the hospital gown. By the way that my heart was pounding, I was certain that I was about to lose it, and this time I wouldn't get it back. Because this time, Cato didn't know me... He hated me... He was going to kill me... The rest of his family couldn't even see him because of me.

For what to be the thousandth time, I realized just how wonderful Cato's life would have been if he had never met me. He would have gone into the Games and won them. He would have been the perfect Victor. The Capitol would have loved him. Perhaps he would have gone the same route as Finnick or Cashmere, but he would have been okay. He was strong. And he could have had someone in secret. Skye and Julie would have been there for him, one way or another. They would have waited until he was old enough to be allowed to settle down and stop working for Snow.

The Capitol would have adored him. District 2 would have reveled in his glory. Leah would still be alive. Cato would have never had to go back into the Games. His life would be the picture-perfect life that he had been expecting when he had volunteered during the Seventy-Fourth Hunger Games. He would have been so much better without me. He would have never gotten to this point - tortured and tormented and so desperate to kill me. Not like he was going to be now for the rest of his life.

"And apart from his memories of Aspen, we don't yet know what else has been tampered with," Plutarch said. What else could they have possibly tampered with? "We're putting together a team of mental health and military professionals to come up with a counterattack. I, personally, feel optimistic that he'll make a full recovery."

Plutarch's voice was bright, but I saw the doubt in everyone else's eyes. "Do you?" Prim asked caustically. "And what do you think, Haymitch?"

That would have been interesting. Haymitch had never been one to hide things from me. At least, things that would hurt me. The rebellion was the only thing that he had ever hidden from me. Anything that would hurt me emotionally, he had never cared much about. Only if I had reacted poorly. I shifted my arms slightly so that I could see his expression through the crack. He looked pained, like a father trying to soften the blow for his daughter after something had gone terribly wrong. He was exhausted and discouraged.

His voice was weak as he admitted, "I think Cato might get somewhat better. But... I don't think he'll ever be the same."

There it was. My final confirmation that Cato was never going to really come back to me. He was gone forever. Perhaps one day he would manage to relax slightly and move on into a new life in District 2. But I was never going to be a part of that life again. I stared at Haymitch for a moment, praying that he was wrong, praying that he was just messing with me. A cruel joke that he loved to play on me. But his face was solemn. Truthful. I snapped my arms back together, closing the crack, shutting them all out. Hopefully forever.

For what wasn't the first time and likely wouldn't be the last time, I wished that I was dead. I began sobbing softly that nearly led to hysterics. I wanted them to leave. I didn't want them to have to see me in hysterics. Their eyes were likely full of pity as they tried to debate on what they wanted to do with me. But I didn't want them to do anything with me. I wanted them to leave me alone. As I had said when I had first gotten to District 13, I wanted them to leave me to die. The way that I should have done so long ago.

There was a horrible feeling of bile rising in my throat. If there was anything in my stomach for me to throw up, I was sure that I would have done it at that exact moment. The truth of the matter had finally sunk in as I realized exactly what it meant. It meant that I was never going to have my husband back, even though he was literally within feet of me. It nearly gave me a heart attack. He was never coming back to me... It would have been better off if he was dead. At least I wouldn't have to see him like this and he wouldn't have to live like that. Close enough for me to touch.

But so far away that it felt like he was on another continent. Cato had officially forgotten about me. At least if he had died during the Quell, I would have known that he was happy with me getting to live on. But I was trapped in this limbo. He was still alive and in so much turmoil. I would never be able to move on, knowing that he was the way that he was. It didn't take long for the Hadley's, Katniss, and Prim to all seat themselves on the edge of the bed that I was in. Brutus and Haymitch were shaking their heads, looking at the floor. Seneca looked like he wanted to clear everyone out.

"Would it be better for him somewhere else? To be somewhere else?" Alana asked softly.

Perhaps he needed to be back in Two. Without me. "We have the best doctors suited to treat him here in Thirteen. We'll keep him in isolation until we feel that he's well enough to move," Beetee said.

"At least he's alive," Plutarch said, as if he was losing patience with the lot of us. My fingers twitched. "Snow executed Cato's Stylist and his Prep Team on live television tonight. Cato's damaged, but he's here. With us. And that's a definite improvement over his situation twelve hours ago. Let's keep that in mind, all right?"

Plutarch's attempt to cheer me up - laced with the news of another four, possibly five, murders - somehow backfired. Carrine. His Stylist. Cato's Prep Team. I hadn't known any of them well, but I knew that they had meant a lot to Cato. They, like my own, had been devastated when they had learned the truth of the Quell. The effort to fight back even more tears made my throat throb until I was gasping again. Everyone tried to calm me down but I kept trying to push them away from me. I wanted to be alone. Eventually, they had no choice but to sedate me.

When I woke, I wondered if that would be the only way I would sleep from now on, with drugs shot into my arm. My night was full of nightmares of what had happened to Cato and a number of attempts to kill me. Each one seemed more realistic than the last. And with the pain in my throat, it was almost impossible to just imagine that it was a dream. When I finally woke, I bolted upright but was unable to scream. I was actually quite glad that I wasn't supposed to talk for the next few days, because there was nothing I wanted to say. Or do.

The last thing that I wanted to do was speak to Cato's family, who had been ordered to give me some space for the first day of my recovery. I had a feeling that it might have been Seneca's suggestion to keep them away from me. I didn't fight anyone on their orders. In fact, I was a model patient, my lethargy taken for restraint, obedience to the doctors' orders. I no longer feel like crying. What would tears do, after all? In fact, I could only manage to hold on to one simple thought: an image of Snow's face accompanied by the whisper in my head.

I will kill you.

This time I had nothing to worry about. No one that I needed to save. Katniss had Prim and their mother. They would be there for each other. Gale would be fine. He hated me right now, anyways. They would all be better off without me. The doctors seemed concerned that I wasn't crying, they wanted me to let out my emotions, but I didn't want to cry anymore. I had nothing to cry about. This was all because of me. I couldn't be upset about something that was my fault in the first place. I could only try and make up all my wrongdoings and die in the end. Cato would get better without me.

Over the next few days everyone that I knew came in to try and reassure me that everything was going to be okay. That I was okay. That Cato was being treated well. Better than in the Capitol, I assumed they wanted to add. Some people even told me that they might be able to fix him. But I hated hearing it. I hated hearing about his recovery. It broke my heart thinking about the pain and torment that he must have been going through because of me. I didn't want to know about what I had caused him to go through.

Numerous people came to see me over the few days that I was in the hospital. Alana and Damien were some of the first. But seeing them was so hard because I always felt like I needed to apologize to them, something that I couldn't do. And it didn't help that every time I looked at them, I saw Cato. But they had reassured me that they didn't blame me for what happened to him. With a notepad that I was given to communicate with for now, I had asked them to leave me be for a little while. They had agreed without complaint and had only looked a little offended.

Skye and Julie were some of my favorite visitors. Mostly because they never talked when they came to see me. Not to each other and not to me. They just grabbed my hands and fed me some soup before turning to leave. They would spend about an hour at a time before leaving, never promising that they would come back. But they always did the next day. Dean and Carrie spent a lot of time with me but they would only come in separately. It was obvious that they thought that seeing the married couple would be bad for me. Maybe it would have been.

Aidan came every now and again. Like Skye and Julie, he didn't talk. He just napped with me. His visits were the most peaceful. A few people from Twelve came to visit, too. Greasy Sae came in to check that I was alright before leaving back to the kitchens. I heard that Finnick wanted to drop by, but considering his position with Annie having just come back stable and well, he evidently didn't think that it would be good for me to see him just yet. It was probably a good idea. But I was happy for Finnick and Annie. About as happy as I could be at a time like this, anyways.

For the first day in the hospital, I cried almost non-stop. Mourning Cato and the life that we could have had together. Too sore to scream but so desperate to do something to let my emotions out. But after that I had stopped crying and had instead focused all of my energy on Snow. I couldn't help Cato, but I could do something about Snow. If I could get to the Capitol, away from Thirteen, the doctors would have a chance to work on him without me around. I could assassinate Snow and then maybe he would be okay when I came back.

Or maybe not. Maybe he would never get back to normal. Maybe I would get killed on the mission. After I killed Snow. That was all that mattered right now. Or even better, maybe I would decide to commit suicide immediately after it was over. I would likely be put on trial after Snow's murder anyways. Likely be executed by Capitol officials. I could just do it myself and save everyone the time. I knew that everyone would be much better off without me. It was obvious enough just from what was happening. Cato would be so much better without me.

But I told no one my real plans. I couldn't, even if I'd wanted to. Ms. Everdeen, Katniss, and Prim took turns nursing me, coaxing me to swallow bites of soft food. People came in periodically to give me updates on Cato's condition. The high levels of Tracker Jacker venom were working their way out of his body. He was being treated only by strangers, natives of Thirteen - no one from Two or the Capitol had been allowed to see him - to keep any dangerous memories from triggering. A team of specialists worked long hours designing a strategy for his recovery.

Gale wasn't supposed to visit me, as he was confined to bed with some kind of shoulder wound. The one that I had seen. When we had spoken after the rescue, I hadn't realized that he was that badly injured. But on the third night, after I had been medicated to get me to sleep and the lights were turned down low for bedtime, he slipped silently into my room. He didn't speak, which I was grateful for, just ran his fingers over the bruises on my neck with a touch as light as moth wings, planted a kiss between my eyes, and disappeared.

It was the only time that I had seen him. Not even. My eyes had been closed. I'd wanted to avoid those gray Seam eyes that had always known how to read the deepest parts of my soul and know exactly what to say back to me. But I didn't want reason right now. I wanted everyone to leave me alone as I imagined plunging an arrow or knife straight through Snow's eyes. Maybe something a little bit slower. A lot more painful. Anything for him to feel just a fraction of the pain that he had caused me for my entire life.

To my surprise, one night even Seneca visited me, nearly a week after I had been confined to the hospital. He sat at the edge of my bed and didn't speak to me for a long time. Like with everyone else, he didn't know what to say. But when I met those dark eyes, I started crying. It surprised me. I had almost thought that I was done with tears. Seneca laid back gently in the bed and allowed me to press my head against his shoulder. I could feel myself starting to choke desperately, but I couldn't stop. Seneca hushed me gently and brushed the hair back off of my forehead.

"I'm so sorry, Aspen. I should have acted faster. We should have gotten him back earlier," Seneca said, his voice shakier than I had heard since that night back in his apartment after he had found out about the rebellion. "I shouldn't have let them leave him in the arena."

Grabbing the pad on the side of the bed, I scrawled out my answer and showed it to Seneca. No, you shouldn't have. I begged you to save him and instead he ended up like this.

"We're not going to leave him like this. I promise you that, Aspen," Seneca said. I sniffled softly. Even though Seneca wanted to fix this, I knew that he couldn't. This wasn't something that promises could fix. Not this time. "No matter how hard it is, we're going to do everything that we can to get him back to himself. He loves you so very much. There's a good chance that he hasn't completely forgotten about you."

Look at him. He hates me.

"He won't always."

The pen stilled in my hand for a moment. Do you think that I can get him back?

Seneca, like Haymitch, wasn't one to hide the truth with me. "Perhaps eventually he can come back. But he isn't going to be able to do this all himself. He's going to need help. And that includes from you. Don't give up on him. Just the way that you know that he wouldn't give up on you. You two will have to grow back together. But I believe that it can be done," Seneca said softly.

For a moment I tapped the pen against the piece of paper. But eventually I dropped them both on the bedside table. I didn't want to write anything more and I didn't want him to speak to me any longer. Seneca clearly knew that there was nothing more that he could say to me right now. He knew that I was falling even deeper into that pit of depression that I had been born into and had never really crawled out of. It would have been better if Cato was in the Capitol where I could at least pretend that he still loved me.

It would have been much kinder if Cato was dead. Not that I wanted him to be dead, but I couldn't help but to think that he would have at least been at peace. Perhaps in that meadow that we had always talked about. Waiting for me. I could have joined him there soon enough. We could have been happy. And at least I would have known that he had died loving me. Or I would have believed that lie. At least I could have made the attempt to move on past him, which I knew that he would have been thrilled to see. He had wanted me to move on even while he was still alive.

Even though I knew what I had to do, it was going to kill me. It had the first time and it would this time. I was going to do what I had done on the train ride to the Quell. Put all of my happy thoughts - and greatest weaknesses - about Cato in a cage and lock it away before freeing it like a bird. After all of this time fighting to be with him, maybe it was finally time to free myself of him. I had held onto him for too long. It was never good for either one of us or anyone who loved us. It was finally time to let him be free of me.

So I thought on all of those times. From the moment that I had met him at the Remake Center to slowly falling in love with him over the course of the first Games. Finally learning what love meant. Sacrificing my life for him. Trying to find a peaceful way to love him in between the Games. Having my reality shattered when the Quell was announced. Learning just how deep my love for him really went. Losing everything in that electrical blast. All of it had caused us so much pain. It was finally time for me to release him. I just needed one last thing.

I reached over Seneca, picked up the notebook and pen and scrawled out: Bring me to him.

Seneca looked very surprised. "I can't allow you to speak with him."

I just want to see him.

Seneca stared at the paper for a moment before nodding. "Okay. I think I owe you that much."

And they did. They owed me so much that it wasn't even funny. They didn't want me to see Cato, but Seneca knew that whatever I was asking for, I had a good reason. And I did. On our way out of the hospital - where we had to be very careful to ensure that no one saw us - Seneca told me that Cato was currently still locked in the restraints. Apparently, he was also behind some sturdy glass that was a one-way mirror. He wouldn't be able to see either one of us but we would be able to see and hear him just fine.

As the two of us strolled down the hall, Seneca kept an arm around my back, probably thinking that I was going to pass out. It wouldn't have been surprising, considering that I had just been administered the sleeping medication. But it hadn't taken effect just yet. My staggering steps were more from the effects of just... everything that I had lived through. The further down the hall that we got, the closer we got to the heart of Thirteen, the more clearly that I could hear voices. All of Thirteen, it sounded like. I turned to Seneca confusedly.

"Coin is making an announcement to the rest of Thirteen. They didn't think that you could handle hearing anything just yet," Seneca explained.

She wasn't particularly wrong about that. Cheers were echoing throughout the District. "Good evening. Just a few days ago, I authorized a covert rescue mission inside the Capitol. I am pleased to announce that the Victors have been liberated!" Coin cried through the speakers.

There was a loud burst of cheers throughout the District. My eyes narrowed into slits as I gazed at the far wall of the hallway. It was a good thing that I was here, because I didn't think that I could tolerate hearing her talk to everyone like she was their savior. She should have fixed things weeks ago. Johanna had clearly been through a lot in the Capitol. Finnick wouldn't have had to deal with the absence of Annie, having to potentially give her up for me and the rebellion. And Cato... He certainly hadn't been liberated.

"Let this day mark an historic change. With the Mockingjay and the Victors beside us, we have sent a clear message to the Capitol, that we will never again endure injustice," Coin continued.

More cheers echoed through the District. My eyes rolled backwards again. She was a good bullshitter. I guessed that it was because I was one, too. But her words bounced around in my head for a few minutes while the cheers only raised. Never again endure injustice? Did she not see what had happened to Cato? I knew that she had. There would always be injustice in the world, until Snow was dead. He was my last mission. Panem could never move on until he was dead. Once he was dead... that was when we would no longer endure injustice.

"Today, a day on which we reunited family, friends, and loved ones, let all of Panem come together. Not to battle for the amusement of the Capitol, but to join hands in this fight!"

No, instead we were destined to have a war. I wandered down the hallway with Seneca, entering the old hospital wing. It was a good thing that it was completely empty, because I was sure that someone would send me back to my own room in the actual hospital. Not whatever this was. Solitary confinement, I supposed. As we continued to walk, I realized that I was wearing the same hospital scrubs that Prim and Ms. Everdeen wore. My legs began locking up from the sleep medication and Seneca grabbed my arm, leading me, trying to keep me upright.

"Let today be the day we promise never to give up, never to give in until we have made a new Panem, where leaders are elected, not imposed upon us. And where the Districts are free to share the fruits of their labors and not fight one another for scraps!"

There were even more cheers as I thought about her words. It seemed like such a nice idea. For all of the Districts to be able to share everything, rather than fight and die and starve to let the Capitol have everything. But could it work? There had been so many years that we had all been providing for one District. I twitched slightly as we wandered down a new hall. It was quiet and sterile. With an immense feeling of shame, I realized that I was terrified that Cato was going to jump out and strangle me again. Even worse, I was itching for my bow to defend myself with.

"This new Panem is on the horizon, but we must take it for ourselves. The road there leads through the sharp mountains and deep ravines of District 2. There in the heart of Panem's steepest mountain range lies the Capitol's principal military facility. We can conquer this stronghold because we are one people, one army, one voice. Because today is our new beginning. Today we have freed the Victors. Tomorrow, Panem!"

We had to be getting close. I knew that we were close. I could feel it. My hands continued to inch down at my waist, desperate for a knife or arrow to defend myself with. What was my problem? Cato was my husband. My problem was that Cato wasn't really my husband anymore. He was no longer Cato Hadley, the love of my life. He was Cato Hadley, the vicious Career from District 2 who had always wanted the little volunteer from District 12 dead. Seneca stopped walking and nodded to a door ahead of us. We were here.

"Would you like me to go with you?" Seneca asked. I shook my head. Just like in District 12, this was one walk that I had to take on my own. "Okay. I'll be here."

On the monitor was Cato's pictures and vitals, none of which I really understood. Johanna's was next to it. I walked through the door and stepped slowly into the room. There were windows at my eye level and I walked up to them slowly. Taking a deep breath, I gathered my courage to look in, preparing myself for what I might see. But I would have never expected what I did. Cato was strapped down to the bed, writhing and struggling in what looked to be sheer panic. My heart sank to the floor as I watched him in horror.

My hand gently raised to the glass, wishing so desperately that I could go to him and reassure him that everything would be alright. But I couldn't. I would only make things worse. It was as I stared at his thrashing form that I realized that nothing was going to help Cato. Not from me, at least. The only thing that would help him right now was for me to be gone. The only way that he would ever get the chance to have some semblance of a normal life was without me. It was at that moment that I realized that grief would always be the price that I paid for love.

It was so painful to realize that I was better off letting go the people that I loved. But just like I had done on that train that had led me to what I had believed was my death before the Quarter Quell, I knew that it was my time to say goodbye. It might have hurt to let the person that I loved the most go, but sometimes it hurt more to hold on. This was one of those moments. But it had to happen. So I did the thing that scared me the most. I opened my heart for a final time and released Cato from it, knowing that it might destroy me, but save him.

Unwilling to watch Cato for a second longer, I turned away, wishing so desperately that I could tell him all of the things that I knew I had to keep to myself. All of those final thoughts that I had never gotten the chance to say. All of those final thoughts that would be stuck in my head forever. Tears began to slip from my eyes as I walked out of Cato's room and closed the door gently behind me. Seneca was waiting for me, his arms open. I kept a few feet of distance between us, wishing that I was the one strapped to that bed.

"Did you see what you needed to?" Seneca asked. I nodded slowly. "Come on. Let's get you back."

The two of us walked back through the halls towards the hospital wing again. I found myself staggering around again, certain that my legs were going to give out. But this time I was positive that it wasn't because of the sleeping medicine. Maybe I had finally lost it. The two of us walked back through the halls as I came to stand in front of the hospital room that I had become so familiar with over the last few weeks. Seneca pressed a hand against my back before turning to leave. I reached out and grabbed his hand to stop him.

He handed me a notepad on it and I scrawled quickly: Stay. Please.

Seneca looked surprised at my offer, but nodded anyways. "Okay," he responded.

Seneca reached out and opened the door to the hospital room. The two of us walked in and I immediately fell down into the bed. Seneca stared at it for a moment before dropping down with me. He looked slightly uncomfortable. Maybe because he knew what had happened the last time that we were in bed together. It didn't matter. I didn't want to be alone. Right now, there was really only one person that I genuinely wanted to be with me. But I had already said goodbye to him. For now, at least. Maybe forever.

When I closed my eyes I just saw Cato struggling against the binds. The bindings that I had put him in... Seneca noted the tears running down my face again as he wrapped his arm up around my shoulder, allowing me to press my head against his shoulder. I buried my head in his shoulder, wishing that I could just hide from the world forever. Hide from the truth. I knew that I had to say goodbye to Cato. I knew that it was the right thing to do. But that didn't mean that it was easy. In fact, it was quite the opposite. It was the hardest thing that I had ever done.

Either way, I was glad that I at least had someone to talk to if I couldn't talk to Cato. There was no way that I could just talk to the Hadley's. Every time I saw them they reminded me too much of him. I couldn't have Katniss or Prim with me. They would just want me to try and communicate with them, which I didn't want to do. I couldn't do it. And Gale... There was no way that I could talk to him. I hadn't spoken to him yet and when I did I had no idea how that conversation would even go. I didn't want to know. Besides Cato, Seneca was the next best thing.

When the two of us woke up the next morning, I realized that we weren't alone. Seneca was already awake, thumbing through the communicuff that was on his wrist, seemingly ignoring an alert. Katniss and Prim had just entered the hospital room. They were giving the both of us a funny look. They looked slightly concerned about Seneca being in bed with me, but they said nothing about it. They knew that I didn't want to explain why he was here. Seneca stood from the bed, gave me the slightest smile and left, promising that he would be back soon enough to check on me.

Once he was gone, Katniss and Prim took their seats on either side of the bed. "They're going to have you try and talk," Katniss explained.

It had been a few days, at least. I wasn't sure how much time I had spent being knocked out. So I merely nodded my consent. I had a feeling that I wouldn't have much choice. A few minutes passed before Plutarch and a nurse appeared in the hospital room. Behind them was Carrie. I assumed that she had been delegated to stay with me from the Hadley's for today. They clearly always wanted at least one of them to be with me. For what reason, I wasn't really sure. The nurse walked up to my bedside, had me sit on the edge, and began working at getting the collar off.

The nurse pulled apart the Velcro strap on the back and slowly pulled it off. "Okay. Okay, I know, I know," the nurse said softly, pushing my hair back off of my shoulders. She gently pressed against my throat and I recoiled in pain. "I'm sorry. I know it's a little tender. Hmm. Okay, let's try your voice now. 'My name is Aspen Antaeus. I'm from District 12.'"

I cleared my throat at best I could before starting, "My..."

The raspiness was so disgusting that I stopped trying to speak. I couldn't force anything more out of my throat. "Okay, take your time. Still got a lot of swelling in your vocal chords," the nurse said softly.

"My... name... is Aspen... Antaeus..." I rasped, looking at the nurse.

My voice gave a high-pitched squeak with each word I forced out. "Good," Katniss said softly.

Carrie and Prim both gave reassuring nods. I turned to Plutarch. "I want..." I started, stopping to clear my throat again when the words didn't form correctly. "I want to talk to him."

Plutarch smiled and shook his head. "He needs time."

"Just for a minute," I argued.

Plutarch shook his head again as Carrie laid her hand on my knee. "Let him have some time to adjust. You'll be able to see him soon enough. He's still too tense to speak to anyone that he knows," Plutarch informed me.

One more time... I just wanted to speak to him one more time. "We haven't even been able to see him yet. You will soon enough," Carrie promised.

"Just one last time," I hissed.

Carrie shook her head. "It's not the last time, Aspen. It's not. They're going to help him. He's going to be fine. He just needs some time. Don't give up on him yet. He wouldn't give up on you," she said sweetly.

But that wasn't the point. The point was the way that the two of us had always been. Cato had always been the hopeful one. I had always been rather pessimistic about life. It was proof by the way that I was thinking right now. Like Haymitch had said, Cato was so far gone that it was doubtful that he would ever really come back to me. He was already barely able to focus for more than a few minutes, as the doctors had told me. And they were complete strangers. The moment he saw me, he would likely lose it all over again.

Plus, there was the issue that I had already released him from my heart. There was a reason that I had done it this early on. It was so that I had time to get used to it. If I had it my way, I would die before the end of the war anyways. But just in case, I needed to be ready to go home and manage a life without him in it, as I had once done so easily. If I hadn't already released him, I knew that I would never be able to do it. But I had. That just didn't mean that I was ready to give up on him though. After all, I loved him.

Love. He's gone, but it isn't.

The next morning, I was discharged from the hospital with instructions from the doctors to move quietly and speak only when necessary. It was fine with me. As usual, I wasn't in the mood to speak or communicate with anyone. I wasn't imprinted with a schedule - as I was technically still in recovery, as I so often was - so I wandered around aimlessly until Prim was excused from her hospital duties and Katniss was back from her classes to take me to our family's latest compartment. 2212. Identical to the last one, but with no window.

It definitely wasn't a step-up. Even I missed that slight bit of freedom that we had. A glance out into the world. Once again, I felt trapped in here. Trapped in Thirteen. In my own mind. In my own misery. At least Buttercup had now been issued a daily food allowance and a pan of sand that was kept under the bathroom sink. As Prim and Katniss tucked me into bed, Buttercup hopped up on my pillow, vying for her attention. Even now I was too weak to bat him away. Prim cradled him but stayed focused on me.

"Aspen, I know this whole thing with Cato is terrible for you. But remember, Snow worked on him for weeks, and we've only had him for a few days. There's a chance that the old Cato, the one who loves you, is still inside. Trying to get back to you. Don't give up on him," Prim said.

For a moment I just stared at Katniss's (and mine, in a way) little sister and thought about how she had inherited the best qualities their family had to offer. Ms. Everdeen's healing hands, Mr. Everdeen's level head, and Katniss's fight. She even had a bit of my strength. Before all of this, anyways. There was something else there as well, something entirely her own. An ability to look into the confusing mess of life and see things for what they were. Was it possible she could be right? That Cato could return to me?

"She's right, you know. He's still fighting hard against what they've done to him," Katniss confirmed.

"He'll come back to you. Just give him time," Prim said.

Could Cato have really fought that hard against the hijacking? There was one thing that I knew. It had obviously been taking effect already just before the bombing of Thirteen, when Snow had had Cato in his clutches for about five weeks. But he had still known me. He had still loved me. He had taken a potentially deadly beating just to save my life. Those extra few days had been what had finally broken him. If he had fought back for that long against the hijacking, could he possibly fight out those altered memories?

It brought some hope into the dark pit that had become my life. "In the meantime, try and focus on something else," Katniss advised.

"I have to get back to the hospital," Prim said, placing Buttercup on the bed beside me.

Katniss glanced down at her schedule. "I've gotta go to go to training. Unless you want me to stay?" she asked. I shook my head. Best not to have them even angrier at my constant disregard for the schedules. "Okay. I'll be back in an hour."

I nodded at her. "You two keep each other company, okay?" Prim said, referring to Buttercup.

Despite having got along for a while during the bombing, we really weren't good to have around each other. Buttercup sprang off the bed and followed her to the door, complaining loudly when he was left behind. I assumed that he had always done that. Honestly, we were about as much company for each other as dirt. After maybe thirty seconds, I knew that I couldn't stand being confined in the subterranean cell having to listen to his constant howls for attention, which I certainly wouldn't be giving him, and decided to leave Buttercup to his own devices.

As I slipped out into the hallway, I wandered towards the center of Thirteen. It didn't take long for me to bump into Alana. "Where do you think that you're going?" she asked nicely.

"Somewhere other than my cell," I mumbled.

My voice was getting stronger but still a little on the weak side. "The hospital or your new compartment?" Alana asked.

"Both," I answered.

Anywhere in Thirteen was a cell to me. Alana nodded in understanding. "How are you feeling?" she asked.

Her eyes were locked onto the ring of bruising around my neck. I shifted awkwardly, embarrassed by them. I knew the look in her eyes. "You don't have to feel guilty about it. I'll survive. My throat hurts and it's hard to talk, but I'll be fine," I explained.

"That's not what I meant," Alana said.

"I know what you meant."

"How are you handling things?"

Someone was bound to ask me eventually, even though it was about as stupid of a question as I could get. "Not well," I admitted. Alana nodded her understanding. "I guess at the end of the day I just keep trying to remind myself that he's alive and away from the Capitol. That's what matters. They're working on getting him better. But at the end of the day, I know that what they're doing isn't going to change things. He's gone and he's not ever coming back. Not the way that I need him to be."

"Don't give up on him just yet," Alana said softly, placing her hand on my shoulder.

"I'm not. Just trying to prepare myself for disappointment," I answered honestly.

Maybe Prim and Katniss were right. Maybe Cato would come back to me. But knowing my luck, he was gone forever. "He loves you so much. That Cato is still in there somewhere and he's fighting to get out. To get back to you. We're all still family. Remember that. We're still here for you," Alana said softly.

They were. And that was the problem. I needed to be away from everything. "I think I'm going to need to leave Thirteen," I spat out suddenly.

Alana's eyes widened. "What do you mean?"

"I can't be here with him the way that he is. While they work on him... I need to be somewhere else."

There was no way that I could deal with the hopefulness and disappointments to come. I only wanted to know one way or another, when it was all over. "Yes, I suppose that I understand. We all understand how hard it is to see him like this. It's hard for us too. But at least he's not trying to... attack us whenever he sees us. We know that this is the hardest on you," Alana said. Not completely true necessarily, but I let her have it. "We know that you're going to have to process this in your own way."

My eyebrow raised. I'd seen that slightly accusatory stare before. "That's directed at something, isn't it?" I rasped irritably.

With everything that was happening right now, was my relationship status still on the forefront of everyone's mind? Until they stopped asking and talking about it, I was always going to be thinking about it. And right now, the only thing that I wanted to think about was just how creative I could get when it came to killing Snow. I shifted slightly, staring at Alana, wondering just how this conversation was destined to go. She didn't look angry or upset, but would that change if she thought that I was betraying her son?

"No, Aspen," Alana said, seemingly noticing that I had been put on the defensive. "We're never going to judge you for anything that you do. However you have to deal with this."

Anything that you do... Apparently people really did think that I was heartless. "You heard about Seneca staying with me last night, then?" I asked sourly.

Alana's gaze dropped in shame. "Yes. I admit that we did."

So my sleeping arrangements were still the talk of the town. "Nothing happened," I said, for what felt like the millionth time when it came to the two of us. "I just didn't want to be alone and he was the first person that I could think to have with me. Someone who wouldn't talk to me. Just... be there for me."

Alana shifted uncomfortably. She would never get used to the idea of Seneca and I being friends. "Things have resolved themselves then? Since that night?" she asked awkwardly.

"Yes. I know that it won't make sense to any of you. It doesn't make sense to my friends either," I explained. Alana nodded, obviously trying to understand where I could see the good in Seneca. "But... he's been there for me for a long time. In his own special way. And now, he's better. Away from the Capitol, he's different."

"We can't pretend that we like it, but..." Alana trailed off.

It took me a moment to figure out what she was hinting at. Things seemed so strange, the way that she was looking at me. Her eyes scanned slowly over me as if to question whether or not I was telling the complete truth about Seneca. That was when I realized what she was actually trying to get at. She was essentially asking me whether or not I was starting to feel something for Seneca with Cato in the state that he was. Once again, my relationship status and dedication to Cato was being put in question. Was my love that hard to believe? Did they all see something that I didn't?

"He's not taking Cato's place. No one can take his place," I reassured Alana.

She seemed to finally notice that I was upset at her insinuation. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to insinuate that. We all know that it's going to take time for anything to change. You and Cato to grow back together or... to move on. Just in case," she said quietly.

Move on... Even they had thought about it. I had already released him from my heart but the thought of moving on still killed me. "Just in case," I agreed softly. My throat was closing and it wasn't from Cato's attack. It was from building tears. "I'm going to go. See if I can do something."

Alana grabbed my arm before I could leave. "Come see us soon, okay?"

"Okay."

Her gaze traveled over my throat. "The bruises are looking better."

"Yeah. It'll help once they're gone. At least I won't have a physical memory of it," I mumbled.

"Good," Alana whispered. She pressed a kiss against my hair and I gave her as much of a pathetic smile as I could muster. "We'll see you soon."

"Soon," I agreed.

Using my designated silence as an excuse I walked off and headed towards anywhere other than the main area of Thirteen. It was hard to navigate though. My head was still spinning from all of the drugs that had been shot into me over the past few days. I managed to get myself lost several times, but eventually I made my way down to Special Defense. Everyone I passed stared at the bruises, and I couldn't help feeling self-conscious to the point that I tugged my collar of my uniform up to my ears to cover them. Maybe I would have to find the Prep Team to have them cover them with makeup.

Gale must have been released from the hospital this morning as well, because I found him in one of the research rooms with Beetee. They were immersed, heads bent over a drawing, taking a measurement. It was the most intent I had seen Gale in quite some time. Versions of the picture littered the table and floor. Tacked on the cork board walls and occupying several computer screens were other designs of some sort. Probably a new attack method. In the rough lines of one, I recognized Gale's twitch-up snare that I had tried to imitate in my first Games and had done so decently.

"What are these?" I asked hoarsely, pulling their attention from the sheet.

"Ah, Aspen, you've found us out," Beetee said cheerfully.

"What? Is this a secret?" I asked.

It almost astounded me how happy Beetee was. Of course, he had never been much for human company. He had always preferred his inventions. Right now he was immersed in one. I couldn't be shocked that he wasn't upset about Cato. He hadn't known him that well, after all. As for what the two of them had been doing, I knew that Gale had been down here working with Beetee a lot, but I assumed they were messing around with bows and guns. Not some type of trap, which was evidently what this was.

"Not really. But I've felt a little guilty about it. Stealing Gale away from you so much," Beetee admitted.

Since I had spent most of my time in Thirteen disoriented, worried, angry, being remade, or hospitalized, I couldn't say that Gale's absences had really inconvenienced me. Actually, most of the time I hadn't even noticed that he wasn't around. Probably because I had other things to be worried about and other people to speak with. Besides all of that, things hadn't been exactly harmonious between us, either. I wasn't sure how they would be now that Cato was back. But I let Beetee think that he owed me.

"I hope you've been putting his time to good use," I said.

"Come and see," Beetee said, waving me over to a computer screen.

So that was what they had been doing. Taking the fundamental ideas behind Gale's traps and adapting them into weapons against humans. Bombs mostly. It was less about the mechanics of the traps than the psychology behind them. Booby-trapping an area that provided something essential to survival. A water or food supply. Just the way that I had done with the Careers' food pyramid in the first Games. Frightening prey so that a large number flee into a greater destruction. Endangering offspring in order to draw in the actual desired target, the parent.

Luring the victim into what appeared to be a safe haven - where death awaited it. My stomach churned. I had done this in desperation in the first Games. But I hadn't had a choice. It was life or death. This was war. Born out of a desire for vengeance and seething hatred. At some point, Gale and Beetee left the wilderness behind and focused on more human impulses. Like compassion. A bomb exploded. Time was allowed for people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second, more powerful bomb killed them as well.

"That seems to be crossing some kind of line. So anything goes?" I asked.

Even I could be brutal. Even I had done some horrible things. Cutting off the Career's food supply. Dropping the nest of Tracker Jackers on them later. Kicking Coral's body down to the wolf mutts. But that was what happened in the Games. That was what they drove you to. I knew that we were in a war right now, but that didn't mean that we had to lose all of our humanity the way that the Capitol had done so long ago. They both stared at me after my comment - Beetee with doubt and Gale with hostility.

"I guess there isn't a rule book for what might be unacceptable to do to another human being," I continued.

"Sure there is. Beetee and I have been following the same rule book President Snow used when he hijacked Cato," Gale said sharply.

Cruel, but to the point. There was something else in his eyes. Perhaps anger over the fact that I wasn't willing to do anything, sacrifice anyone, to win the war. But I honestly didn't care how angry he was with me. I was sick of people being angry with me. So I left without further comment. I felt that if I didn't get outside immediately, I would just go ballistic, and a fight was the last thing that I needed right now. Especially since screaming would likely do some serious damage. I wanted to get outside but I was still in Special Defense when I was waylaid by Haymitch.

"What?" I asked shortly.

"Come on. We need you back up at the hospital," Haymitch said.

"What for?" I asked.

"They're going to try something on Cato," he answered.

"What are they doing?"

"Send in the most innocuous person from Two they can come up with. He's been calmer with the doctors, but they're strangers to him. So we're going to test his response on someone he remembers from his home. Find someone Cato might share childhood memories with, but nothing too close to you. They're screening people now."

Not a bad idea but something that I didn't really know how it was going to work. After all, it would be almost impossible to find someone that only Cato knew. That could have been some of the people from Two who were in Thirteen. But there weren't many of them. Most were Cato's family and they wouldn't be allowed in. They were a direct link to me. But did anyone in Thirteen now actually have childhood memories with Cato without any connection to me? I had thought that all of his friends were still back in Two.

Haymitch clearly didn't know who they were using, as he gave me a look that said not to ask any more questions. I knew either way that this was going to be a difficult task, since anyone Cato shared childhood memories with right now was going to be his family. Who else did we have? When we reached the hospital room that had been turned into a work space for Cato's recovery team, there sat someone rather surprising chatting with Plutarch. Probably not planning on chatting with Cato, but still interesting to see down here. Delly Cartwright.

It was surprising to see her down here as most of the people who had survived the bombing of Twelve tried to avoid being out and about in the center of Thirteen. Or out of their compartments. I rarely saw them away from their jobs. As always, Delly gave me a smile that suggested that I was her best friend in the world. She gave that smile to everyone. Katniss joined my side and I nodded at her. Delly gave the same smile she had just given to me to Katniss. They knew each other slightly better than I knew her.

"Aspen!" Delly called out.

"Hey, Delly," I said.

"Hi, Katniss!" Delly said happily.

"Hi, Delly," Katniss responded.

I'd heard that she and her younger brother had survived. Her parents, who ran the shoe shop in town, weren't as lucky. She looked older, wearing the drab Thirteen clothes that flattered no one, with her long yellow hair in a practical braid instead of curls. Delly was a bit thinner than I remembered, but she was one of the few kids in District 12 with a couple of pounds to spare. The diet here, the stress, the grief of losing her parents have all, no doubt, contributed. I still couldn't believe that she was as happy as she was. Even here. Even now.

"How are you doing?" I asked.

"Oh, it's been a lot of changes all at once." Her eyes filled with tears. "But everyone's really nice here in Thirteen, don't you think?"

For a moment I just stared at her. I supposed that it had been so long since I had talked to her that I had almost forgot what Delly was like. Just how much light she could always put into a situation. It was probably one of the many reasons that Katniss and I were never that close to her. We had always been the downers. But Delly really meant it. She genuinely liked people. All people, not just a select few she had spent years making up her mind about. I had a feeling that she would even find something good to say about the Capitol people if given the chance.

"They've made an effort to make us feel welcome," I said. I thought that it was a fair statement without going overboard. "You're not the one that they picked to go speak to Cato, are you?"

"Oh, no. Cato doesn't know me. He doesn't trust me," Delly said thoughtfully.

"He doesn't really trust anyone right now," I responded.

"I guess so. Poor Cato. Poor you. I'll never understand the Capitol," Delly said.

"Better not to, maybe," I told her.

"So, who are they picking to speak to Cato?" Katniss asked.

"Me."

We both turned to see a tall boy around my age. I stared at him for a moment before it dawned on me. "Oh... Felix," I muttered. He was one of the few District 2 residents who had evacuated with the Hadley's. "It's been a long time."

Felix nodded, placing a hand over my shoulder. "Yes, it has. Sorry to see what's happened to him."

"Well they're trying to get him back. I suppose that's what matters," I muttered. I had never been good with people offering me their condolences. "Are you okay with speaking to him?"

"I'm fine with it. Especially if it helps him start feeling better and getting back to normal," Felix said.

"Felix has known Cato for a long time," Plutarch said.

Katniss nodded. "Oh, yes." Felix's face brightened just the slightest bit. "We played together from when we were little. I used to tell people he was my brother. We always loved his family," Felix said, motioning to their other friend, Marcus.

"That's nice," I muttered awkwardly.

It was useless to tell them that I was sorry for destroying their friend's life. They knew that. "What do you think? Anything that might trigger memories of you?" Haymitch asked me.

"Maybe... Cato doesn't know that Felix ever met me. He doesn't think so," I explained. "The only problem would be because Felix helped him prepare for the Quell, where Cato was going to protect me."

"I doubt that would be much of a problem," Brutus put in.

"We'll pull you out if it becomes a problem," Plutarch added.

"What about Delly, for future attempts?" Haymitch asked.

If there was anyone new who they could get Cato to trust, it would be Delly. "I think I mentioned her to him once when I was telling him about Twelve. He's never met her though," I said.

"No common links?" Haymitch asked.

"No. He knew Peeta but he has no idea that Peeta and Delly were ever friends. As long as she didn't bring up his name, I doubt that Cato would ever catch the connection," I said blankly.

"And as for Katniss?" Haymitch asked.

Cato did know Katniss. "We were all in the same class. But we never overlapped much," Katniss explained.

"Aspen and Katniss were always so amazing, I never dreamed either one of them would notice me. The way that they both could hunt and go in the Hob and everything. Everyone admired them so," Delly said.

Did people really admire us? I had always thought that they had just tolerated us. It was Prim that everyone loved. Haymitch, Katniss, and I all had to take a hard look at her face to double-check if she was joking. To hear Delly describe it, the two of us had next to no friends because we intimidated people by being so exceptional. Not true. We had next to no friends because we weren't friendly to anyone but each other. Sometimes not even then. Leave it to Delly to spin the two of us into something wonderful.

"Well that's a nice way to put it," I muttered.

"And a lie," Katniss added.

"Oh, it isn't," Delly gasped.

"Delly always thinks the best of everyone," I explained. Delly smiled softly. "I don't think that Cato could ever make any bad memories associated with her."

"And we're sure that Cato never connected you and Felix?" Brutus asked, trying to get back to the original problem.

For a moment I stared at him. "No," I answered. Then I remembered. "Wait. In the Capitol. Cato and I were sitting together one day in the arena, talking about our homes, when he mentioned Felix as one of his friends to me."

"I remember," Haymitch said. We had been in the cave in between the Feast and the Death Match, chatting away, getting to know each other and trying to pass the time. "But I don't know. It was just a passing comment. Felix wasn't actually there. I don't think it can compete with years of childhood memories."

"Especially with such a pleasant companion as Felix. Let's give it a shot," Plutarch said.

Plutarch, Brutus, Haymitch, Katniss, and I went to the observation room next to where Cato was still confined. It was crowded with ten members of his recovery team armed with pens and clipboards. The one-way glass and audio setup allowed us to watch Cato secretly, just as I had done the other night. He still laid on the bed, his arms and waist strapped down. He didn't fight the restraints, but his hands fidgeted continuously. His expression seemed more lucid than when he tried to strangle me, but it still wasn't the one that belonged to him.

As we walked further into the observation room I noticed that it wasn't just the members of the recovery team. I was more than a little surprised to see that Cato's family was there. It must have been the first time that they were allowed to see him since he had tried to kill me. Although I would have thought that they wouldn't have wanted to have to watch him right now. But I was glad that I wouldn't have to watch whatever was about to happen by myself. Katniss grabbed onto one of my hands as I stood by the window.

"Perhaps you shouldn't watch," Plutarch told Cato's family.

Alana turned a heated gaze on him. "He's my son. If I'm not allowed to speak to him, I want to at least be allowed to see him. No matter what state he might be in," she hissed.

"You alright?" Dean asked, coming to stand next to me.

"No," I croaked.

"Us either. But it'll be okay. He just needs some time," Carrie promised.

Cato had said it himself at our wedding. We had never had time. Not then and not now. I wasn't a patient person either. When the door quietly opened and Felix slipped into the room, Cato's eyes widen in alarm, then became confused. I tensed slightly. I knew that Cato wouldn't be able to break out of the binds - he wasn't fighting them at all as opposed to when I had seen him the other night - but I didn't want someone else to feel his crushing grip. Felix crossed the room tentatively, but as he neared him he naturally broke into a smile.

"Cato? It's Felix. From home."

"Felix?" Cato questioned. Some of the clouds seemed to clear. "Felix. It's you."

"Yes!" Felix said with obvious relief. "How do you feel?"

"He's too close," Haymitch told Plutarch as Felix seated himself on the edge of Cato's bed.

"It's okay. He can't get free," Plutarch responded.

"Awful. Where are we? What's happened?" Cato asked.

"Here we go," Haymitch said.

"I told him to steer clear of any mention of Aspen or the Capitol. Just see how much of home he could conjure up," Plutarch said.

"Well... we're in District Thirteen. It's a real place. The rumors are true. We live here now," Felix told him.

"That's what those people have been saying. But it makes no sense. Why aren't we home?" Cato asked.

Felix bit his lip nervously. "There was... an accident. I miss home badly, too," Felix said awkwardly. "I was only just thinking about those times that we used to run through the street to see who was the fastest. You were always miles ahead of everyone else. Remember when we were almost expelled from school for continuously skipping class to do it?"

"Yeah. We kept getting caught," Cato said blankly. "You said... about an accident?"

Even from here I could see the sheen of sweat on Felix's forehead as he tried to work around the dangerous question. "It was bad. No one... could stay," Felix said haltingly.

"Hang in there," Haymitch said hopefully.

"But I know you're going to like it here, Cato. The people have been really nice to us. There's always food and clean clothes, and school's much more interesting," Felix said.

"Why hasn't my family come to see me? Leah. Where is she?" Cato asked.

My hand reached out to press against the glass separating the two of us. I wanted so desperately to run after him and give him the largest hug that I ever had. But I couldn't. Partially because everyone would stop me and partially because Cato would try and kill me the moment that I walked into the room. Tears began to build in my eyes. I wasn't sure how he knew about what had happened to Leah, but he knew. He was in there, all by himself, and he couldn't even have his family come and comfort him. All because of me.

"They can't." To my surprise, Felix was tearing up. "They'll see you soon. A lot of people didn't get out of Two. They're still there. For now, we'll need to make a new life here. I'm sure they could use a good painter," Felix said, trying to change directions again. "Do you remember when your mother and father used to let us paint the walls in your house? They were always blue."

"There was a fire," Cato said suddenly.

"Yes," Felix whispered.

"Twelve burned down, didn't it? Two had a martial law put in place. Because of her," Cato said angrily, his voice taking on a strained tone. "Because of Aspen!"

Even though Felix hadn't said anything about me, it was too late. That was just how strong his hatred for me ran. He didn't even have to be reminded of me. He just automatically assumed that everything terrible that happened was tied to me. I supposed that he wasn't completely wrong about that. Cato looked like he was about to cry for a moment. His chest rose and fell quickly as he glared at a far wall, his lips forming my name. Then he began to pull on the restraints around his wrists.

"Oh, no, Cato. It wasn't her fault," Felix said.

"Did she tell you that?" Cato hissed at him.

"Get him out of there," Plutarch ordered.

Even though Cato was still strapped down to the bed - and the restraints were obviously strong enough to hold him - I could tell that they didn't want to upset Cato more than he already was. The whole point of this was to try and keep him calm. But he was already thinking of me and that had clearly set him off. My stomach churned as Cato's eyes dilated in fury. The door opened immediately and Felix gently stood from the bed so not to upset Cato. He then began to back toward it slowly.

"She didn't have to. I was -" Felix began before losing his train of thought. "She didn't tell me anything."

"She's a liar, Felix. It's a trick," Cato seethed.

My hand dropped off of the glass. He hated me this much... "Cato, what you're saying isn't real," Felix said comfortingly.

Something eerie dawned in Cato's eyes as Felix approached him again. "She sent you here to talk to me. She knows you're here now," Cato said quickly.

"It's okay," Felix tried to reassure him.

"She knows... You can't trust her!" Cato shouted suddenly, yanking against the restrains. Felix shot up from the bed and backwards in surprise. Even I jumped slightly. "Because she's lying! She's a liar! You can't believe anything she says! She's some kind of mutt the Capitol created to use against the rest of us!"

"No, Cato. She's not a -" Felix tried again.

"Don't trust her, Felix," Cato said in a frantic voice. "I did, and she tried to kill me. She killed my friends. My family. My sister! My child! Don't even go near her! She's a mutt!"

"Get him out of there!" Haymitch shouted.

Tears built in my eyes as I stared at Cato. Saliva was running from his mouth as he shouted over and over again. Screaming about how I was a mutt, how I had killed everyone he had ever loved, stolen his life from him, and destroyed everything. And he wasn't wrong about a single thing. In a way, I was a mutt created by the Capitol. I wanted to scream back to Cato that I loved him, that I would never hurt him, but even that would have been a lie. I had hurt him so much already. A hand reached through the doorway, pulled Felix out, and the door swung shut. But Cato kept yelling.

"A mutt! She's a stinking mutt!"

Not only did he hate me and wanted to kill me, he no longer believed that I was human. He believed that I was responsible for single-handedly destroying his entire life, which wasn't a lie. Cato's family was watching him with tearful eyes. Alana had her hands pressed firmly on the glass, wanting so desperately to comfort her son. For the first time, even Damien showed signs of weakness. Skye and Julie were crying softly. Carrie had her head in Dean's shoulder. Aidan sniffed back tears. It was less painful being strangled.

"You have to kill her, Felix! You have to kill her!" Cato screamed.

Around me the recovery team members were scribbling like crazy, taking down every word. I stared blankly at Cato, willing myself to not love him anymore. Not when I could so plainly see that he was never coming back to me. Haymitch and Plutarch grabbed my arms and propelled me out of the room. Maybe to try and shield me from what was happening. But it was too late. I had already heard what he had to say about me. The two of them leaned me up against a wall in the silent hallway. But I knew that Cato was continuing to scream behind the door and the glass.

Prim and Katniss were wrong. Cato was irretrievable. So, I shifted my focus to something else, anything else. There had to be something that I could do to change everything. And that was to kill Snow. Kill him and... at least get the slightest bit of repentance for everything that he had done to me and the people that I loved. A few seconds after I was pulled into the hallway, Katniss and the Hadley's joined us. They all stared at me, waiting for me to say something, but there was nothing that I wanted to say.

"Aspen?" Plutarch called.

"It's going to be okay, Aspen," Dean said, placing a hand on my shoulder.

I stared blankly at the wall that I knew Cato was behind. "This is just a conditioned response," Plutarch explained.

"Kill her!" Cato's voice echoed through the walls.

"It's not him," Plutarch continued.

"She's a monster! She's a mutt!"

"No, it's not him," I breathed.

The moment that I made to run off, something else dawned on me. Something that had slipped out of Cato's mouth while he was screaming about how terrible I was and how Felix had to kill me. Something that he had said that finally occurred to me. He had said something about me killing his sister. Technically true. But he had also said something about me killing his child. Did he mean from his memories about the Interview when we had faked the pregnancy in the Quell? Was the Tracker Jacker venom affecting that memory?

"Aspen -" Alana started.

"What did he say? About me killing his child?" I interrupted.

The entire Hadley family whipped around. "Nothing. It's part of the hijacking. His memories of that night in the Interviews when he said that you were pregnant have been altered," Haymitch explained quickly.

But his face had already paled slightly. It had just been for a moment, but I had still managed to see it. Just that one hint of truth that I needed. My mind was racing. Not from what I had seen, but just from that one word. What was it that Seneca had told me a thousand times already? There was a secret that no one wanted me to know... But it was mine... What if the secret was that I really was pregnant? Could I have been? Cato and I weren't exactly being careful during training. I had thought that I was going to die in a few days, after all.

Did the math work out? Come on, Aspen. Get it together for two minutes. Figure this out. I tried to shut out my grief over Cato and think back those few weeks. When was it that we had slept together for the first time in the Capitol before the Quell? It had been on our second night there. We had gone through training, the wedding, the interviews, and the time in the Games. There was a period of about ten days before the electrical shock had taken me down. Nasty enough to kill an unborn child... Long enough for the tracker to pick up traces of the pregnancy hormone...

The miscarriage wasn't just a lie that we had been telling the Districts. It was a lie that they were feeding me. "That's the secret..." I muttered.

"Aspen -" Haymitch called.

Before I got the chance to sprint away, Seneca's voice echoed through the hallway. "I warned you to tell her before it came out the wrong way. I warned you that this was going to happen."

"I need - I need -" I gasped, staggering back against the wall.

"Aspen, wait a second," Katniss said, grabbing at my arm.

Just one more thing destroyed because of me... "What are you talking about?" Alana asked Haymitch sharply.

Everyone was trying to touch me. I wanted them away from me. "Aspen, get back here. We need to talk," Haymitch said.

Brutus tried to grab Haymitch and pull him away, but Haymitch pushed past him and grabbed onto me. "Don't touch me," I snapped.

"Hang on a second," Haymitch said, reaching for my wrist again.

"Don't - fucking - touch - me!" I howled so loudly that everyone jumped away from me and Thirteen was plunged into an eerie silence. Something in my throat cracked painfully and I was sure that I had done some permanent damage to my voice. Good. You deserve it. "Get away from me."

My breaths were coming in dry sobs as I staggered out of the hallway, pushing past all of the arms that were reaching out for me. I could hear Katniss telling everyone to leave me be for a few minutes as she began nastily snarling at Plutarch to tell her what was going on. Skye and Julie joined that conversation just moments later. As I staggered away from them I heard Haymitch following me, trying to speak with me, but I didn't listen to him. He merely let me stagger away, keeping close enough to catch me if I fell but not daring to try and touch me as I made my way to Command.

There was only one person who could help me right now. Something had definitely ruptured in my throat as I found myself swallowing blood as I walked. I'd have to get them to fix that before I went to the Capitol. After that I could bleed out for all I cared. I was sure that I made a number of missteps on the way to Command since my eyes were filled with tears, but I had nothing to be crying about. For once, there was nothing that I could blame the Capitol for. It was all on me. This time Snow didn't do it. This was all my fault.

Not that I had known... But I guessed that I should have known in some way. Or I should have been more careful. Something. Walking behind us, I could hear Cato's family and Katniss trying to get answers out of Seneca. He seemed to be following us as well. Probably trying to ensure that I wasn't going to do something stupid. I wasn't. This was something that had been a long time coming. Coin had made me the promise that I would get to kill Snow. This was my time to make her live up to that promise.

Even though no one was actually telling me what was going on (and no one had yet confirmed that Cato was telling the truth) I didn't need it. The way that Haymitch had reacted and hadn't reassured me that it was a lie... I knew the truth. I didn't need verbal confirmation. I knew exactly what Cato meant. It all made sense as to why no one wanted to tell me the truth. I had lost enough at that point. I had already been barely clinging on to my will to live. They didn't want me to think that I had lost that too and give me a final push to off myself.

So, it turned out that I really had taken absolutely everything from Cato. From the moment that I had laid eyes on him during the first Games, when he had proven his love for me, I had repaid him by completely ruining his life. As I slammed right into a young boy I realized that I couldn't stay here. I needed to distance myself from Cato, once and for all. It didn't break my heart this time. I couldn't even look at him right now. It would cause a big problem, my wanting to leave, but I couldn't keep destroying things for him. He needed to heal somewhere that I wasn't.

"Do you want me to tell you about it?" Haymitch asked, following me closely.

"No," I rasped, that one word incredibly painful.

Both physically and mentally. I had definitely damaged something even worse than Cato had with my shout. "Where are you going?" Haymitch asked as I practically broke through a metal door.

"Command."

"Aspen, you can't ignore this forever."

"Watch me," I snapped. There was no danger of tears. Perhaps passing out from exhaustion in every form of the word, but not tears. "You wanted to keep it from me anyways."

"I always meant to tell you."

"I didn't need to know," I gasped.

That was one truth that I never needed to know. Seneca was wrong about that. They should have either told me right away or let me live with it in ignorant bliss forever. That one thing - a family, a stable future - was the one thing that I thought I hadn't robbed Cato of. Turned out that was a lie too. Plutarch was now following behind us. Once I finally managed to find my way to Command I shoved the door open and stumbled into the room, Haymitch and Plutarch following close behind me. I had clearly interrupted what looked to be a strategy meeting.

"There's not enough manpower coming in from Four," Coin was saying.

"I don't think that's a problem," one of the three men that were chatting with Coin said.

Coin glanced up, finally noticing me. "Please, come in."

"With any kind of manpower, if we..." the man continued.

"Will you excuse us for just a moment?" Coin interrupted him.

"Of course."

"Have a seat," Coin said. I rounded the table, sitting away from Haymitch and Plutarch and taking a place across from Coin. I leaned back slightly in the chair. "I'm glad you're feeling better."

"Snow has to pay for what he's done. I want to help the rebels in any way I can," I said.

There was no point in beating around the bush. Coin let out a soft breath. "It's hard to see Cato this way."

"That's not Cato," I said numbly, trying to ignore the crack in my voice. "I can't stay here anymore. If you want me to be the Mockingjay, you'll have to send me away."
"Where do you want to go?" Haymitch asked.

"The Capitol. I'll do anything," I said.

It was the only place that I could think of where I had a job to do. There was only one thing that I wanted right now. More than I had ever wanted anything. To take the tip of one of those explosive arrows and plunge it through Snow's eye socket. Or perhaps his stomach. Something that would make his death slow. Torturous. Just the way that he had made my life. I stared straight into Coin's eyes, already sensing her hesitation to send me to the Capitol. No one looked thrilled at my suggestion. But it was obvious that they didn't care for what I wanted.

"Can't do it. Not until all the Districts are secure. Good news is, the fighting's almost over in all of them but Two. It's a tough nut to crack, though," Plutarch said.

Of course Two would be the one District that was still fighting against the rebels and the rebellion. If it wasn't such a large District, it likely would have already been overrun by rebels. That was what had happened in District 1 and District 4 a few weeks into the fighting. I hated to admit it, especially right now, but Plutarch was right. The first step was getting the Districts to stop fighting each other. Next was the Capitol. And then I would hunt down Snow. One extra step in my plan but I had waited this long. I could wait another few weeks.

"Fine. Send me to Two," I relented.

Coin gave me a scrutinizing stare before saying, "You heard."

It wasn't a question. "Yes. I did. And I can't stay here while I'm processing it," I said honestly. I couldn't see Cato or his family or hear about his progress. I needed to be away from him. "I need to be somewhere else, where I don't have to think about it. You want me to fire up our troops? Call out to the loyalists? You've seen what I can do."

"Yes, I have," Coin whispered.

Chapter 15: Chapter Fifteen

My entire body seized up in horror as the nightmare wrapped itself further around my brain, ensnaring me in a never-ending night of panic. Eventually I managed to jolt myself awake and free myself from the confines of my own mind. As I shot upright in the cot, I practically threw myself onto the floor. I managed to steady myself at the edge of the bed, place my head at my knees, and count down from ten. I was just calming down when I realized that there was a figure in corner. A stab of fear sliced through me when I realized that it was Cato. He's here to kill you. Run.

My legs locked underneath me, ready to spring into a sprint at his slightest movement. But Cato walked towards me slowly, as if approaching a wounded animal. "Hey... it's okay," he said reassuringly. "Just a dream."

For a moment, I swore that I saw the old Cato. My husband. Was it real? Was he back? "Cato?" I asked cautiously, through heavy breaths.

"It's me," Cato said, seating himself at the edge of the bed. "Want to talk about it?"

"No," I said quickly.

Cato must have noted how defensive my positioning was. Legs tucked under me, muscles tightened, ready to take off at the slightest warning that something was wrong. He remained perched at the edge of the bed, not daring to move closer to me. I watched his fingers, waiting for the slightest hint that he might reach out and wrap them around my throat. But he made no indication that he would move to attack me. His eyes were his own again. Soft and caring and, dare I say it? Loving. Cautiously I shifted towards him a few inches. His fingertips gently worked through a strand of hair.

"You don't hate me?" I whispered.

Cato's eyes widened in shock. "Of course, I don't hate you. Why would you think that?" he asked.

"Y - You tried to kill me," I stammered.

A smirk worked its way across Cato's face. "Maybe a few years ago, I did," he teased. I continued to stare at him. "Aspen, I love you. It's all okay. It's just a dream. A bad dream."

Could that have been all that it was? Just a bad dream? One of my biggest nightmares in the world had been having to lose Cato. Especially since I didn't know how to live without him. But I needed to know. Was my mind playing tricks on me again? I looked into his crystal eyes and spotted my own reflection. Tired but alert. My eyes slowly trailed down towards my throat. I nodded, risking a smile to myself. There were no bruises. Whatever had happened between the two of us was just in my dream. He loved me. He never hadn't.

"Sorry. I'm sorry," I breathed. "It was so... lifelike..."

"I know. They usually are," Cato said. Sensing that I had relaxed slightly, Cato pulled me closer to him, clearly noticing that my hands cemented themselves in his shirt. "Are you sure that you don't want to talk about it?"

"I'm sure. I'm so happy to see you," I said happily.

"I'll always be right here. Always," Cato promised, his hand resting at my heart. He glanced down at me. I could see my watery eyes reflected in his own. "What is it?"

"In my dream..." I began, "I -"

Nothing more came out. I jumped wickedly when the door to our bedroom flung itself open. I would have collapsed back off of the bed had it not been for Cato. My first instinct was to grab my bow and shoot the intruder, but I quickly realized that I wouldn't hurt the figure that came dashing inside. Because I was more than a little surprised to see that it was a little girl. She looked just like me, blonde hair flowing behind her, but she had Cato's icy eyes. The little girl instantly jumped into the bed and curled up in Cato's lap. There were tear trails down her cheeks.

"Daddy," the little girl sobbed.

"What's wrong?" Cato asked her.

"I had a bad dream."

"Oh, yeah? What was the bad dream about?"

The softness of Cato's voice was alerting. I had never heard him like that before. Not even with me. The little girl shook her head at Cato before turning to face me. I realized, with a little jolt of my stomach, that the little girl was clearly my daughter. The one that I had just dreamed that I had lost. The one that I had never thought that I would want. Cato released the little girl, who instantly jumped up onto her knees, scooted across the bed, and curled up in my lap. I stiffened at her touch as Cato began running his fingers through her hair.

Just as I was trying to force myself to relax, Cato spoke again. "Emilia, did you tell mom about your game?"

"Not yet," Emilia said, sitting back up on her knees to face me. "Daddy took me into the woods today and taught me how to catch a bird. Want to hear?"

"Yeah," I managed to choke out.

Emilia, so clearly named for my late mother, leaned back and let out a three-tuned, four-note, whistle. For a moment I didn't understand. It took me a while to place. That was when it dawned on me. It was the same tune that Rue had shown me so long ago in that first arena. The one that they let the Mockingjay's pick up. The same one that had become my theme during the rebellion. A warning that the Mockingjay was near. I must have taught it to my own daughter at some point. Did I tell her where the whistle had come from? How I'd learned it?

"And it works?" I asked.

Emilia nodded as Cato stood from the bed. "Come on, munchkin," Cato said, holding a hand out to Emilia. "Let's go to bed."

"Daddy -" Emilia groaned.

"Wait," I interrupted, pulling them back. "Let her stay."

Cato turned back to me in surprise. "You sure?"

"Yeah."

Slowly Cato turned back to the bed and laid down next to me. The three of us all moved towards the pillows to tuck ourselves in. I laid down against Cato's chest, so relieved to feel his touch again, as Emilia placed herself between the two of us. Her back was against my front as she curled into me. Nervously, after laying there for a few minutes, I began to stroke back her blonde hair. I could feel Cato's fingertips tracing patterns over my back as Emilia began to drift off. Once I was sure that she was asleep, I laid a hand over her stomach protectively.

It took just a few minutes for Emilia to fall back asleep from whatever nightmare that she had been having earlier. Once I was sure that she wouldn't wake up, I glanced up at Cato. He had been looking at both of us. His spare arm reached over Emilia to pull me in for a gentle kiss. We stayed far enough away from each other to make sure that we didn't wake up our daughter. Who I had been so sure that I had lost long before I had even gotten used to having her. As we pulled away from each other, I smiled at Cato. He raised a brow playfully at me.

"She's beautiful," I commented, the words getting stuck in my throat.

"She looks like her mother. Looks a lot like her grandmother too," Cato said. I gave him a small and slightly teary smile. Things were so right, for once. Cato gave me a concerned look. "Aspen... are you sure that you're alright?"

"Just had some really terrible nightmares tonight," I said.

"They're just nightmares. Look at me," Cato said. I turned towards him. "I will always love you."

Each one of his words held a protective nature behind them. I sniffled slightly. "I know," I breathed. No one could ever take that love away. "I -"

"Aspen?"

My eyes shot open. For a moment, everything was still dark. Then figures and shapes began forming in the dark room. I was momentarily surprised to see myself down on the floor on top of a small and rotting cot in the spare bedroom that Katniss and I were sharing for the night. My dream world shattered around me as I realized that Katniss was staring down at me, not Cato. It was a dream. Of course. Katniss looked more than a little concerned about me, as she had been for the past couple of weeks. She pulled back from me to sit upright. I followed her movements.

"What?" I asked, wiping the sleep from my eyes.

"Having a bad dream?" Katniss asked carefully.

"Was I thrashing around?"

"Not really. You actually looked kind of content," Katniss said. I nodded blankly. "But you kept mumbling something."

"His name?" I asked.

"Something else."

"Oh. Sorry."

Katniss shook her head, letting me know that it didn't matter that I had woken her up. I could only assume that I had likely been muttering Emilia. Even if Katniss had understood me, she wouldn't comment on it. She had been very careful speaking to me about everything. Cato was very rarely mentioned between the two of us. Only when Katniss would rouse me from a nightmare and I would ask if I was saying his name, as I had been known to do. I had said Cato's name out loud less than five times since arriving. But there was one thing that I had spoken even less about.

Just moments after negotiating with Coin my departure to District 2, Seneca had found me. He knew all of my hiding spots, which was exactly where I had gone until I had been allowed to leave. There was no one that I wanted to see or speak to. Of course, he had never cared much for leaving me alone. Especially not now, when so many people thought that it was better that I wasn't alone. Seneca had tracked me down behind the boiler and given me the confirmation that I needed. He had handed me over the medical file that was almost immediately tossed back at him.

All I needed to see was the tiny plus sign next to the medical terminology that I didn't understand. It was enough for me to realize that I had, indeed been pregnant during the Quarter Quell. The tracker had been able to pick up the slightest traces of the pregnancy hormone in my body by the second day of the competition. According to Seneca, I couldn't have been more than ten or so days along. He had mentioned that, if not for how advanced technology in the Capitol was, I would have never even known. I likely wouldn't have known myself for another week or two, at least.

Needless to say, Snow and the rest of the Gamemakers had been shocked at the revelation that I really was pregnant. Even though Cato had played the entire thing off like it was a lie, it turned out to have been the truth. There was actual proof. Because of that, Snow had deliberately withheld any true proof of my pregnancy. According to Seneca, it was to keep what he hoped was some shadow of doubt over me. He wanted people to not believe my story. He wanted them to have doubts that I really was pregnant. Which would have made sense, since I had always given off an innocent air.

They would have had every right to doubt my truthfulness. As it had all turned out, Snow had allowed me to play the miscarriage card. I had always been so surprised that no one had spilled the truth that would have caused me to lose audience sympathy. That was why. Mostly because proof could have easily leaked that I was pregnant from the doctors in Thirteen. So, Snow had decided to let that one play out, knowing that giving actual proof (rather than just my word) would have earned me even more sympathy throughout the Districts.

As it turned out, very few people actually knew the truth of my situation. In the Capitol, Snow and the Gamemakers (and likely some of his inner team) knew. Back in Thirteen, Haymitch, Seneca, Plutarch, Beetee, and Coin were some of the few. Plus, the doctors who cared for me after the electrical blast - all of whom had been sworn to secrecy. Cato had obviously been told at some point while he was being held in the Capitol. It had come as a complete shock to everyone else. Very few people had even realized that the two of us had been intimate.

Katniss and Ms. Everdeen were the only ones who had. But I had promised both of them that we would be safe. I had really thought that we were being safe. So had Cato. He had promised me that we were being perfectly safe. But I supposed that, with both of us thinking that we were going to die in a matter of days, neither one of us had been concerned with potentially conceiving. We had just been trying to have a few last days of love and fun before we died. Too much fun, as it seemed. This was what I had paid for those few days of fun.

Despite trying to ignore them, I knew that a lot of people were upset by the news that I had really lost a baby. With Cato's shout and the big mouths in the hospital wing, news traveled fast around Thirteen. I had left the District just after news broke to try and avoid having to talk about it with anyone. Prim and Ms. Everdeen had both called almost immediately after Katniss (who refused to let me leave alone) and I had headed to District 2. They hadn't said much other than to let me know that they were willing to listen if I wanted to talk or just cry.

They had never mentioned the baby or anything else. They merely offered to just lend an ear. Which was much appreciated, but I wasn't planning on taking them up on it. I didn't want to talk about what had happened back in the hospital wing or in the bedrooms of the Tribute Center. Katniss had never dared ask me about it, other than to ask if it was the truth. I had told her that I didn't know for sure (which I hadn't when she had asked), but the timing would have worked out.

As it turned out, neither Finnick nor Johanna knew the truth. Not in the Quell and not immediately after. None of the Tributes had known the truth. Effie and Fulvia hadn't know. The Prep Team didn't know. But they had woken Cato and I up that morning of the Interviews; we had been naked. They must have known. Apparently, they had all been inconsolable from the news. I knew how they felt. But I was perfectly happy without them knowing. Because now there were so many questions that constantly ran through my mind.

Was it a boy or a girl? Which one would I have preferred it to be? Did I have a preference? Would Cato have made a good father? Actually, that one I knew. He would have. Would I have made a good mother? That one I didn't know. What would our little family have been like? I had never wanted kids before, but to know that I had been so close to having one with the love of my life only to lose it after I had already lost everything else... It had devastated me in ways that I hadn't even known were possible.

When I had been brought into District 13, I had been rushed to the hospital wing. For the first few days I had passed in and out of consciousness a lot. Tests had been performed on me almost immediately to determine any damage that had been done by the blast. That was when the doctors had discovered the truth and had then told those closest to me. Seneca had voted to tell me. Haymitch, Plutarch, Coin, and Beetee had agreed that I was too weak to know the truth. The information was deliberately withheld from my friends and family for fear that they would tell me the truth.

All of my friends had seemed as shocked about the entire thing as I was. I was glad that I didn't have to see Prim or Ms. Everdeen's faces. I had a feeling that they would hurt me even more. I had desperately tried to avoid Cato's family and friends since the news had broken. They had apparently wanted to speak with me after it had come out but the doctors had advised them to stay away and allow me to process the news. The news that I, just like my own parents, had almost become a young mother. But unlike them, my child had been taken away from me.

Haymitch had contacted me more than anyone else and, just a few days ago, I had had it out with him. He had been constantly trying to get me to admit that I was upset about it. He wanted me to open up about it. But I had merely shouted myself mute for a few hours over it. Screaming that he should have told me and that I didn't want to talk to anyone about it. I just wanted to forget about it until I could die. That was the last time that Haymitch had tried to get me to talk about it. He had left me alone about it since.

It turned out that I had done some serious damage to my vocal chords from my shout back in the hospital wing. I'd known that I had, considering that I had been swallowing blood afterwards. The doctors in Two had to do some type of surgery to fix what I had ruptured as soon as I had arrived. I'd been put under and allowed to rest the next day as visitors came to welcome me. The doctors in Thirteen had wanted to do the surgery there (since they knew me and my history) but I had refused. I'd wanted to leave as soon as possible.

So, with those thought in mind, Katniss and I had come to District 2 with some of Cato's family. They had refused to not be allowed along. I wasn't surprised. It was their home. But I was surprised that they were still being warned to give me some space. Dean, Damien, Skye, Julie (whose foot had healed since District 8), Felix, and Marcus were all here. I always saw their longing stares, but they never made a move to speak to me. Felix and Marcus were being permanently relocated to District 2. I knew that they would be happier here. Even Brutus was back in Two for the time being.

Even Brutus was leaving me alone these days. I was grateful for it. I assumed that even he realized that I was too fragile to hear any jokes right now. Not after everything that I had been through over the past few weeks. In fact, he gave me mostly reassuring looks each time that the two of us passed each other in the streets. Perhaps we were finally getting around to being friends. Or, if not friends, allies. Perhaps he had finally realized that I loved Cato as much and more than he did. We both cared for him. We were both hurt without him here.

During the rare times that I managed to pull myself together long enough to interact with the residents of District 2, I tried to put on a brave face. In the end, it was very difficult to tell if the people here genuinely liked or hated me. Probably a little bit of both. Many of them had loved the Games and had been infuriated when Cato had abandoned Clove for me, thus ultimately leading to this miserable end to the Games. People spent a lot of time trying to tell me stories about Cato's childhood in Two, but they only broke my heart for two very different reasons.

Just like at the hospital in District 8, people seemed genuinely heartbroken to tell me that they were sorry that I had lost the baby. Even those who didn't seem to like me weren't happy to hear about my loss. It was harder now than it was in Eight because I realized that it was the truth. There was no lying about it this time. My tears and choked sobs were real. Just as their grief for me was. There were still a number of people who didn't seem to care one way or another. Many seemed to tell me that they were sorry simply because it was the right thing to do.

Most of the rebel forces in District 2 were made up of Cato's friends and family. The ones who knew the torture that the Games put people through. There were also a number of fighters who had lost close friends and family members to the Games. The ones who understood the loss and pain that Snow had put us all through. The others were primarily made up of the lower-class stone cutters. It was one of the only things that Damien had said to me since arriving in District 2. The wealthy were apparently still the primary forces fighting against the rebels.

Unfortunately, word had now gotten out to those in District 2 that we had rescued Cato from the Capitol. I had tried to put on a brave face and tell all those who were worried that he was okay. Just recovering from his ordeal over the past few weeks. I continuously tried to reassure them that he would be alright and back home in Two soon enough. At Plutarch's suggestion when I had been on my way to Two, there was no mention of the hijacking. Cato's alliance to me was half of the reason that there were as many District 2 rebels as there were.

The kids liked to hang around me a lot, which wouldn't have normally bothered me. But right now, I so desperately wanted them to leave me alone. Not that I said that. I merely let them tell me about how much they loved Cato being around while they were growing up. It hurt me to hear just how happy he used to be in District 2. Especially now that he could barely function without getting furious over the mere memory of me or aggravation over his constant confusion. I had destroyed everything for him.

"Ready to go?" Katniss's voice echoed.

I broke away from my thoughts, turning to stare at her. "Do we have a plan today?" I asked.

"Not really," Katniss said. There was never anything on our schedules. We merely did whatever we could. "Anything that you want to do?"

Yes... There was actually one thing that I wanted to do. "Let's go on a tour of the District."

"Should I call one of the camera crews to go with us?"

Normally the camera crews in District 2 would come with us to film short propos. Show the Capitol people that we weren't going to simply give up. We might not have had District 2 in our pockets just yet, but we were working on it. It also showed that I was still active in my role as the Mockingjay, since I was almost constantly in the Mockingjay armor. The one thing that I could constantly think was that Snow must have been seeing me. He must have known that I wasn't dead. His trick with Cato hadn't worked and I wasn't giving up on my mission to kill him.

"No. No, I only want you to come with me," I said determinedly.

With everything that I needed to do right now, I couldn't have the camera crews following me around. "Alright, let's go," Katniss said.

"Hang on," I said, placing my hand in front of her stomach. "Get changed."

"Why?"

"We're too recognizable like this."

"Okay."

Katniss didn't have the same armor that I did, but she was wearing something similar. People knew who she was as well as they knew me. Right now, I didn't want anyone potentially following us. The two of us grabbed sets of simple civilian clothes - which we used whenever we went out into public. I was perfectly content in my simple clothes. I felt stupid walking around in the Mockingjay armor anyway. Katniss and I pulled our hair out of the braids that they were in, even further obscuring our identities. Without our weapons, most people wouldn't recognize us.

District 2 was a large District, as one might expect, composed of a series of villages spread across the mountains. Each was originally associated with a mine or quarry, although now, many were devoted to the housing and training of Peacekeepers. None of that would present much of a challenge, since the rebels had Thirteen's air power on their side, except for one thing: At the center of the District was a virtually impenetrable mountain that housed the heart of the Capitol's military.

Cato had once told me about it. The village that Cato had lived in (before ultimately moving to Victor's Village) was one of the closer villages to the base of the mountain. It housed some of the richest civilians of District 2. Apparently, the mountain had been where the toughest Peacekeepers and soldiers worked and trained. But the majority of the mountain was set aside for civilian workers - much like the old mines in District 12. The District 2 workers managed the mountain. It reminded me very much of the mines that Mr. Everdeen and Mr. Hawthorne had died in.

We never spoke about it, but I knew that Katniss was thinking the same thing that I was. The mountain reminded me almost painfully of the mines. I was terrified to ever set foot in it, which I knew that we would eventually have to do if we wanted to take the mountain and then move to the Capitol. We had nicknamed the mountain the Nut since I had relayed Plutarch's 'tough nut to crack' comment to the weary and discouraged rebel leaders here. It was perhaps one of the most useful things that I had done since arriving here.

The Nut was established directly after the Dark Days, when the Capitol had lost Thirteen and was desperate for a new underground stronghold. They had some of their military resources situated on the outskirts of the Capitol itself - nuclear missiles, aircraft, troops - but a significant chunk of their power was now under an enemy's control. Not that they had ever told any of the rest of the Districts. We had all been left to believe that they were the most powerful. Of course, there was no way they could hope to replicate Thirteen, which was the work of centuries.

However, in the old mines of nearby District 2, they saw opportunity. From the air, the Nut appeared to be just another mountain with a few entrances on its faces. According to Cato, it was to keep the other Districts from starting to get concerned over how powerful they were. The Capitol allowed them to show off the mountain as a mere border between itself and the Capitol. But inside the mountain were vast cavernous spaces where slabs of stones had been cut, hauled to the surface, and transported down slippery narrow roads to make distant buildings.

To my surprise, there was even a train system to facilitate transporting the miners from the Nut to the very center of the main town in District 2. It ran right to the square that Cato and I visited during the Victory Tour, standing on the wide marble steps of the Justice Building, trying not to look too closely at Clove's grieving family and all those who felt that they had been robbed of a real Victor assembled below us. It was part of the reason that I couldn't bear to go too close to the mountain. I couldn't be there without remembering what had led us here.

It was not the most ideal terrain, plagued as it was by mudslides, floods, and avalanches. I had never realized that District 2 had so many problems before. But even Cato had mentioned it to me during the Victory Tour. They were still one of the Districts. Treated much better than the rest of us, but still not as favored as the people in the Capitol. The mountain might have been dangerous, but the advantages outweighed the concerns. As they'd cut deep into the mountain, the miners had left large pillars and walls of stone to support the infrastructure.

The Capitol had reinforced these and set about making the mountain their new military base. Filling it with computer banks and meeting rooms, barracks and arsenals. Widening entrances to allow the exit of hovercraft from the hangar, installing missile launchers. But on the whole, leaving the exterior of the mountain largely unchanged. A rough, rocky tangle of trees and wildlife. A natural fortress to protect them from their enemies. It wasn't until the beginning of the rebellion that we had realized what the Nut truly was.

By the other Districts' standards, the Capitol babied the inhabitants here. Just by looking at the District 2 rebels, you could tell they were decently fed and cared for in childhood. Some did end up as quarry and mine workers. Others were educated for jobs in the Nut or funneled into the ranks of Peacekeepers. Trained young and hard for combat. The Hunger Games were an opportunity for wealth and a kind of glory not seen elsewhere. Just the way that Cato had been. It was mere coincidence that Cato's family had ended up in more laborious jobs.

That wasn't to say that they hadn't trained. Each one of his family members had trained for the Games in some way or another. Alana had been a stay-at-home mother, as had Carrie. But they had both trained with knives. Damien was a stone-cutter. So was Dean. They had trained for the Games, too. Dean had so nearly been a Tribute, as had Dean. The rest of the members had been kids with the exception of Cato. He had been a Victor. No job would have ever suited him other than being a sword trainer for the kids. Each and every one of them had still been advantaged beyond belief.

Of course, the people of Two swallowed the Capitol's propaganda more easily than the rest of us. Embraced their ways. Cato and Clove, Glimmer and Marvel; they had all been thrilled to be here. They learned too late what the Games meant. Once they were already dead. I remembered Cato telling me that it wasn't worth it at the end of the first Games. All of that training had been for nothing. In the end, they fought and died in the Games, no different than any of the rest of us. Just disillusioned.

For all that training that they did over the years, all of the confidence that they had, at the end of the day, they were still slaves. Even more so than perhaps we were in the outlying Districts. At least we knew that we were slaves. In Two, it had taken the rebellion for them to realize and some still didn't. If all that was lost on the citizens who became Peacekeepers or worked in the Nut, it was not lost on the stone cutters who formed the backbone of the resistance here. Or the loved ones of those who had learned too late what the Games really meant.

Things stood in District 2 as they did when I arrived two weeks ago. The outer villages were in rebel hands, the town divided, and the Nut was as untouchable as ever. Cato's own home was as torn as the rest of the Districts. Some despised me and the rebellion. Others supported it and were sick of losing their loved ones. The few entrances of the Nut were heavily fortified, its heart safely enfolded in the mountain. While every other District had now wrested control from the Capitol, Two remained in its pocket.

It wasn't surprising in the slightest. Everyone knew that things were very torn here and I was only making that divide stronger. I just wished that Cato was here to convince the people who weren't easily convinced to fight back against the people in the Capitol. But he was lost to me. Wishing for him was useless. All he would do was try to kill me for everyone to see. It was better just to tell people that he was back in Thirteen and undergoing extensive rehabilitation from his ordeal in the Capitol - which wasn't necessarily a lie.

Each day, I did whatever I could to help. Even if it felt like it was barely anything. Visit the wounded. Tape short propos with my camera crew. They had come with me to Thirteen, but I didn't see them much when it wasn't official filming time. I wasn't allowed in actual combat for safety measures, but they invited me to the meetings on the status of the war, which was a lot more than they did in Thirteen. I didn't understand much of what they were saying, but it was freeing to think that I now had a real part in the war. It was much better here.

Freer, no schedules on my arm, fewer demands on my time. I lived above ground in the rebel villages or surrounding caves. For safety's sake, I was relocated often. During the day, Katniss and I had been given clearance to hunt as long as we took a guard along and didn't stray too far. The people in Two seemed to be grateful for a change in the dried food that they had been having lately. I knew what fresh meat could do for someone. In the thin, cold mountain air, I felt some physical strength returning, my mind clearing away the rest of the fogginess.

It was the first time in months that I felt like I might have been able to actually understand what was happening. I could understand exactly what it was that I had lost. I knew what was happening in Two and the rest of the Districts. I was aware of what was happening in the Capitol. The entire war finally made sense to me. For the first time since I had been dragged from the arena in the Quell, everything made sense to me. The only unfortunate thing was that with this mental clarity came an even sharper awareness of what had been done to Cato.

Snow had stolen him from me, twisted him beyond recognition, and made me a present of him. Boggs, who came to Two when I did, told me that even with all the plotting, it was a little too easy to rescue Cato. I knew what he meant. That attack had been too easy. They could have easily cut them off and killed them. Boggs believed if Thirteen hadn't made the effort, Cato would've been delivered to me anyway. Dropped off in an actively warring District or perhaps Thirteen itself. Tied up with ribbons and tagged with my name. Programmed to murder me.

Memories of him were constantly in my mind. All of the nights that we had spent comforted in each other. His arms wrapped around my body, protecting me from the horrors of the night. I remembered all of the sweet words that he had told me throughout the past year. All of the many times that he had reassured me throughout our relationship. All of those many things that I had lost. The mere knowledge that I had lost the only person that had always believed the best in me.

It was only now that he had been corrupted that I could fully appreciate the real Cato. Even more than I would've if he'd died. The kindness, the steadiness, the warmth that had an unexpected heat behind it. I had finally lost that man that believed that I could do no wrong. And I knew that I had never fully appreciated him. I deserved to have lost him, even though it broke my heart. Outside of Prim, Katniss, my mother, and Gale, how many people in the world loved me unconditionally? I think in my case; the answer may now have been none.

Not even the people who had once promised me that they would always be there for me. Cato's family. Damien and Alana had lost their son. He might have been here in body, but he would never come back in mind. They knew that they had lost their son. Carrie and Dean were clearly having a hard time getting over what had been done to him, as was Aidan. As for Marley, she would never know the big cousin that I had taken from her. First Leah and now Cato. Between the two of them and District Two's status, I knew that it had really strained my relationship with Cato's family.

Brokenhearted, desperate to forget all of the pain that my relationship with Cato had caused, I had removed the wedding ring from my finger. It clearly didn't go unnoticed by Katniss. She had stared at the pale band of skin around my ring finger but said nothing. I was simply waiting for the pale strip of skin to tan like the rest of me. Erasing just a little bit more of the relationship. The wedding ring hadn't been tossed, though. It now rested with his own wedding band on the chain around my neck. A simple reminder that there was real love in my life at one point.

Sometimes when I was alone, I took the pearl from where it lived in my pocket and tried to remember the boy with the never-ending love, the strong arms that warded off nightmares on the train, and the kisses both in and out of the arena. Those nights spent in bed together. The strong Career that had been willing to do anything to protect the one person that had the potential to make him weak. I remembered all of those moments that we had shared in the dead of the night. That life that I had been so relieved to find.

As I would stare at the ring in the middle of the night, I tried to make myself put a name to the thing I had lost. But I still wasn't sure what it was. Yes, he was my husband. But it still didn't completely feel like it. What were we? I didn't know. I didn't have an exact name for what the two of us had been. In the end, what was the use? It was gone. He was gone. Whatever existed between us was gone. Our potential family was gone. All that was left was my promise to kill Snow. I had to tell myself that at least ten times a day.

Back in Thirteen, Cato's rehabilitation continued. Every moment of every day a highly trained team of mental specialists and doctors worked on every angle of Cato's recovery. Even though I didn't ask, Plutarch gave me cheerful updates on the phone each time something happened with Cato's recovery. Some of my favorites had been 'Good news, Aspen! I think we've almost got him convinced you're not a mutt!' Even better was when Plutarch told me 'Today he was allowed to feed himself pudding!'

Allowed to feed himself... Thinking that I wasn't a mutt... We were far away from those two lovesick kids who had spent the day together tangled in themselves up on the rooftop of the Training Center. They were gone and they were never coming back. Katniss always sat with me whenever Plutarch started telling me about Cato's recovery - a term that I liked to use lightly. The least that I could do was listen to how things were going, even though I didn't want to know. I just wanted to forget. I wanted to forget everything between us.

It was too hard to listen to the hope in Plutarch's voice every time that he spoke to me. Mostly because I was so sure that he would never be back to normal. Any bit of hope was just something that would get destroyed later. It wasn't worth it. Whenever Haymitch would get on the video chat after Plutarch would say goodbye, he admitted that Cato was no better. It didn't surprise me. I was sure that he would never be back to normal. The only real - but still dubious - ray of hope had come from Prim.

"Prim came up with the idea of trying to hijack him back," Haymitch told me one day.

"What's that mean?" I asked.

"Bring up the distorted memories of you and then give him a big dose of a calming drug, like morphling."

A slight concern shot through me. "Won't that be dangerous?" I asked. Another freak-out would just set them back again. "Most of those were of me fighting. That would send him into some kind of panic."

"We can't use most of them. We're only working with videos of the two of you talking. More friends than lovers," Haymitch explained.

"There can't be many of those," I growled.

"There aren't," Haymitch said.

"Which ones are you using?" I asked.

When had the two of us talked without becoming lovers or at least flirting? I couldn't think of any. "We've only tried it on one memory. The tape of the two of you in the cave, when you told him that story about getting Prim the goat," Haymitch explained.

Right... He had asked me to tell him a story that day in the arena. "Any improvement?" I asked.

The two of us had just been very friendly that day. We were getting to know each other. Trying to be friends, not lovers. Not at that moment. "Well, if extreme confusion is an improvement over extreme terror, then yes," Haymitch said. I arched a brow. What did that mean? "But I'm not sure it is. He lost the ability to speak for several hours. Went into some sort of stupor. When he came out, the only thing he asked about was the goat."

A horrible searing pain shot through my chest. I remembered that day well. Sometimes I dreamed of it. I had gone out and gotten soup for us that morning after Cato had let me sleep for almost an entire day. We had chatted back and forth for hours, exchanging stories and small talk. When he asked me to tell him a story, he had seemed so peaceful. The day was so nice. No deaths. But I did remember that look that he had given me when I had refused to admit that we had gotten Prim the goat just to make her happy. Was that the part that he remembered?

"Right," I said.

Katniss laid a hand on my shoulder. "That's still an improvement, Aspen."

"I guess," I mumbled.

"What about his family?" Katniss asked Haymitch.

"They allowed Skye to talk to him the other day," Haymitch said.

My head shot up from my lap. "How'd that go?" I asked.

"For a while, it went pretty well. They were talking like old friends," Haymitch said. My heart dropped. For a while... "Then Cato mentioned her sister. Before Skye got the chance to tell him that she had been killed in an air raid, he -"

"We don't need to hear. I think we know how this story ends," Katniss interrupted him.

We all knew what had happened. Of course, the same thing had happened that had happened every time before it. He had lost his mind over me all over again. Skye's sister had been a Victor years before Cato and I had ever won the Games. We hadn't mentioned her much, but clearly Skye's sister had been killed already. Cato must have thought that her death was my fault. Why knew? Maybe it was my fault that she was dead. I didn't care to ask Skye what had happened. The guilt would only get even worse if I knew that it was my fault.

"How's it out there?" Haymitch asked.

"No forward motion," I told him.

"We're sending out a team to help with the mountain. Beetee and some of the others. You know, the brains," Haymitch said.

"Okay."

"Seneca would like to speak with you," Haymitch said.

It wasn't surprising. "Okay." I turned towards Katniss and said, "Give us a second?"

"Sure. I'll wait outside," Katniss said.

"Thanks."

On the camera, Haymitch headed off, probably back to a meeting with Coin and the others. As Katniss walked off, the camera jostled around for a moment before Seneca appeared. "Good morning, Aspen," Seneca greeted.

"Hey," I said.

"How are you feeling today?"

"I'm alright."

The two of us remained in silence before Seneca said, "You've been oddly quiet recently."

It was enough to send a spike of anger through me. "What do I really have to say? Everyone that knew lied to me. You tried to tell me the truth. You wanted to tell me the truth but you thought that Haymitch should have been the one. Which I understand. But one of you should have told me. I had the right to know," I snapped.

"No one knew if you could handle it," Seneca reasoned.

"Of course, I couldn't," I scoffed. "But I still should have known. It shouldn't have been thrown on me like that."

"You're right."

The last way that it should have come out was having Cato yell that I had killed his child in a rage-induced haze. "Does he really understand what happened?" I asked curiously.

"In a way. We can't explain it to him. Those memories are all too closely tied in with the hijacking," Seneca explained.

If he even thought that I had done it purposely - if that was what Snow had told him - he would never be able to get over it. "Tell me the truth. Do you think he'll ever be the same?" I asked sharply.

"No," Seneca said. My heart sank. "But I don't think that either one of you will ever be the same. You're not those two kids who came into the first Games. You're not the lovers of the Quell. You're two young adults who were dragged through something far too complicated for them. You won't ever go back to those two kids that said 'I volunteer.' But I believe that, in time, the two of you can grow back together. But you have to give us time to work on him."

Long ago I had come to the conclusion that I would never again be that young girl that had volunteered for Prim. I would never sit in the Hob and laugh carelessly with Katniss and Gale again. I would never go running through the woods, scaring off all of the animals. Katniss would never yell at me for my careless nature again. Gale would never call me Tiger again - a word that had once been so weightless. A word that now reminded me of another lifetime. Like whenever I started thinking of that old life, I felt a stab of longing for someone's company. Anyone's.

"I don't think I've ever been this lonely," I muttered.

"You're not alone," Seneca said.

"Feels that way.

"Remember who loves you. Your mother, Katniss and her family, Gale and his family, Cato's family, Haymitch, many of the rebels, and I do."

"Unconditionally?" I shot back.

"You might be surprised. Remember something, Aspen. You're only twenty years old. Barely. You have time. You have time to have a husband and a family. Your life isn't over yet. Not even close," Seneca said.

He was right about that. I was only twenty. Still practically a baby myself. There were still many years for me to have a life. So, why did it always feel like I was ancient? Why did it feel like there was a clock counting down the moments until I dropped dead? Perhaps because I was waiting for it. Just like that clock in the jungle, ticking away the hours of my life. Only this time, I was the clock. Counting down until I was ready to kill Snow and die for it. Tick tock...

"I can't believe that I was that careless," I huffed suddenly.

This always would have been horrible, but that particular loss of life made things even worse. "You thought - you intended for yourself to die. No one can fault you for that," Seneca said.

"If I'd known maybe I -"

"Wouldn't have shot that arrow? Thrown the entire plan into disarray? Gotten yourself stuck in that arena? Both of you would have been executed. The rebellion wouldn't have a ground to stand on."

Unwilling to speak about it any further I said, "I think they need me for something."

Seneca knew that I was lying, but he nodded his consent anyway. "Okay. We'll talk soon."

"Yeah."

"Goodbye, Aspen."

As per usual, I didn't actually say goodbye. I had merely shut off the camera. That had been a few days ago and that was the last time that I had spoken to either one of them. Everyone had agreed that I needed some time to be alone. As I walked out of the stronghold, I waved goodbye and thanked the people who had agreed to keep me overnight - an older couple. I chatted with them for a moment, trying to be as upbeat as possible, before heading off with Katniss. The two of us barely made it three steps before running straight into my guards. Tick and Tock, as I had named them.

"Where are you headed?" Tick asked.

He was only discernable from his twin brother by the scar underneath his right eye from a bombing in Two a few weeks ago. "To Victor's Village," I answered.

"It hasn't been cleared," Tock said.

"Well I'm going there anyways," I said stubbornly.

"We can't allow that," Tick said.

"I wasn't aware that I was asking your permission," I said.

"Soldier -"

"Is this really worth an argument?" Katniss interrupted Tock, rolling her eyes at the argument. "Let us go to Victor's Village. What's the harm? You can wait on the outskirts. We have the pagers with us if you need to let us know that something's coming."

"This wasn't in the agreement," Tick growled.

"Let the girl go," Tock said.

"Something you need there?" Tick asked me.

It was only something that I would know when we saw it. "Maybe," I muttered.

The twins looked at each other before nodding their consent. "Come on then," Tock ordered.

They didn't look happy with me disturbing their plans, but I didn't care. There was something that I needed to see. Without saying another word to each other, or warning anyone else of what we were doing, Katniss, Tick, Tock, and I headed towards Victor's Village. I hadn't been in the small part of town since arriving in District 2 for fear that it was being occupied by Capitol loyalists. It currently stood empty but the risk was too great for me to be considered to even go there. It was a dangerous move, but I didn't care. I needed to go there and I couldn't have the cameras watching.

It took us almost ten minutes to arrive. District 2 was much more spread out than District 12 - even without the spans of woods that surrounded my home. When we walked in, I noticed that it was much better cared for than ours had been. Much larger, too. Extra houses had been built for the overabundance of Victors from Two. I didn't speak as we walked towards the fountain at the entrance of the Village - a mirror image of the one in Twelve. I merely headed towards the first of the houses. Like the rest of them, it seemed to be abandoned. I glanced around in silence, wondering which one was Cato's.

"Wait there," I ordered Tick and Tock.

They didn't like being bossed around by me, but it was their job both to escort and listen to me. "Yes, ma'am," they both said.

As we walked further into the Village, Katniss offered, "Do you want me to come with you?"

"Check that side, will you?" I asked numbly.

I didn't need to tell her what I wanted. She already knew. "Okay. Give me a shout if you need something."

"You too."

Even if she didn't find Cato's house, she would likely dawdle, knowing that this was something that I needed to do alone. If she did find it, she would likely yell for me and then leave me to my devices. The first home that I walked through was Brutus's. I arched a brow curiously as I walked through. He was such a secretive man. In every way. Even his own home had nothing homey about it. It was all white and black furnishings. No pictures. Nothing to signify that he'd ever even had any visitors. The only way that I knew it was his was a single picture of him, many years younger, wearing the Victor's crown.

The temptation to further search his old home was overwhelming, but there was something else that I was here for. So, I left Brutus's home with a promise to myself to learn more about the Victor. The second home belonged to an older Victor. She had participated in one of the Thirtieth or so Games. I remembered seeing her tapes as we prepared for the Quarter Quell. A skilled scythe user and, evidently, a grandmother. There were four little children in a picture with her. Were they dead? Was she dead? I left the house without another thought and wandered into the next.

The moment that I entered, there was no doubt in my mind. It was the home that I had been looking for. It was the Hadley's. I wandered through the home for a few minutes, spotting all of the photographs that were hung on the walls and sitting on the tables. They looked so happy in each of them. I was almost halfway through the bottom level when something dawned on me. The walls were blue. Cato's favorite color. The same color that his parents had gotten sick of because there had been so much of it. Evidently, they didn't hate it that much.

It was painfully obvious just how close the family had been. In all of the pictures, there were at least two of the family members sitting together. All of the kids together for what appeared to be a forced photo. The parents and adults all laughing around a dinner table. The kids playing together in the yard. The parents holding the kids. It was the sweetest thing that I had ever seen. There was barely an inch of the walls that weren't covered in some type of photograph. The entire family had been so happy right up until I had smashed headfirst into it.

Halfway through the main level, a particular picture of Cato's family stood out to me. It was one that I had never seen before. The entire family was perched around a couch that appeared to have been in his old home. The kids were sitting on the couch while the adults were standing behind it. A rare smile appeared on my face when I realized that Leah was in the center of the picture. She was sitting propped up on Cato's lap, smiling broadly and giggling. It looked like it had been taken a few days before the first Reaping. They all looked so... happy.

Right next to that photo was a framed one of Cato and I's wedding. I placed the one of his family back down on the table softly before picking up the wedding photograph. The two of us appeared to be locked in our first dance - similar to the photograph that I had in my home at Twelve. Cato's head was down next to my ear and I seemed to be giggling at something he had said. What was it? I didn't remember. My heart gave a horrible tinge at the sight of us. The two of us would never be those two happy kids again.

"I had a feeling that you'd make your way here eventually."

Slamming the photograph back down on the table, I whirled around to come face to face with Dean. "Thought I'd be here alone," I muttered.

It had been days since I had last seen Dean. "I've been hanging out around here for the past few days. Quieter here without all of the noise from the Academy, you know," Dean explained. I stared blankly, waiting for him to say what he wanted. "I've been waiting to see when you would get out here."

"Just wanted to... see it..." I muttered dumbly.

Dean looked around, a sad gaze in his eyes. "Yeah. I know how you feel."

"Is it hard being back here?"

"In a way. It's good to be back home. But there are a lot of memories here."

"Trust me, I understand."

The two of us stared at each other for a moment before I looked away. Dean seemed to finally notice where my gaze had been before. "That picture was taken the day after Cato got back home," he explained.

"Oh, I thought this was from before the Games," I muttered.

He looked exactly as he had in the Games. But he was smiling. That was why I'd thought that it was from before. "No. It was taken the day after his return. We were standing in front of the television and watching you reunite with your family. It was a nice day. Cato looked so happy that you were finally back home," Dean said.

"I was," I whispered, remembering the loving embraces on the platform. "I hope he gets to come home one day."

"With you?" Dean asked curiously.

We were far past that. "No. He hates me. He deserves so much better than me," I mumbled.

Something flashed in Dean's eyes. "Can I tell you a story?" he asked. I shrugged my shoulders, which he took for a yes. "It was a few days after he came back home. We were in the process of moving into the new house. Cato and my mother were in the kitchen. I was walking around when I overheard them. Stopped and listened in on the conversation for a while."

Fifteen Months Earlier...

Dean was wandering back and forth throughout the new house in Victor's Village. He had seen them a thousand times before and even been in one once or twice, but he had never actually imagined that he would own one. Not after he had given up his spot as a volunteer in the Games to stay home with Carrie. But Cato had won his Games just a few years later and now the entire family lived in Victor's Village. The air was excitable as everyone ran back and forth, acclimating the new home. Dean moved to check out the kitchen when he realized that two people were already in it.

"Finally got that house in Victor's Village that we always talked about," his mother said, placing a box down on the counter.

"Yeah," Cato said blankly, staring out the window.

His mother turned back to her middle son worriedly. "You don't sound too happy about being here."

"You were right," Cato said suddenly.

"About?"

Dean moved a little closer to hear them better. "The Games. They're not worth it. We were a pawn in the Games from the beginning. Aspen was right about one thing. They never intended for us to win together. They let us spend day after day together with the hope that we would be able to win together, only to show us what they'd always meant to have. The most dramatic showdown in history," Cato explained.

Dean sighed at his younger brother. Apparently, that was what had been bothering him the last few days. "They got their dramatic showdown. Just perhaps not the one that they were expecting," his mother said.

"Yeah."

"Tell me something. The truth, away from the cameras. Is it real?"

Dean arched a brow. He had always assumed that it had been real. He'd never seen Cato with someone like he was with Aspen, after all. "Do you think it is?" Cato asked curiously.

"I don't think you're that good of an actor," his mother said. All three of them grinned. "I've seen you with a lot of girlfriends before, none of whom I was that fond of. I like Aspen. She's not your usual type."

She was right about that. Cato's usual type was a polar opposite of Aspen. "No. She's not," Cato agreed.

"You're in love with her?"

"Yes," Cato said, smiling for the first time that day.

"I know," his mother said, smiling back. "My only warning to you, Cato... I think that Aspen is a wonderful girl. But I also think that she's a danger to the Capitol, which could make her a danger to anyone near her. She's brave and bold. Two things that the Capitol doesn't like from a Victor that they can't control. You just need to make sure that she's worth it."

"She is," Cato said immediately.

That was the moment that it really dawned on Dean. Just how much Cato loved the girl from District 12. His mother stared at her son as if seeing him for the first time. "She changed you," she commented.

Cato nodded. "Yeah. I guess she did."

His mother smiled. "It's a good change. I like it."

"Me too," Cato agreed.

"That's the first time I've seen you smile in a long time."

"I smile all the time," Cato said confusedly.

His mother shook her head. "No, you smirk all the time," she corrected. Dean grinned. They had all long since become accustomed to Cato's confident smirk. "It's been a long time since I've seen you smile like that. It was the way that you smiled at her during the Games."

"You'll like her a lot," Cato said.

They had only met for a few brief minutes but everyone had already liked her. Mostly for what she had done for Cato. "Seeing the man that she's managed to turn you into in just a few short weeks. Going from a boy who was willing to do anything to bring honor to his District to a man who would die to keep an innocent girl safe... I like her already," his mother explained. Dean nodded his silent agreement. "Although I think you have some explaining to do to Skye and Julie."

Everyone knew that Cato's two best friends had eyes for him. "Yeah, I know," Cato muttered awkwardly.

The two of them were quiet for a moment. "What about that boy from home that they talked about earlier in the Games? Gale Hawthorne, I think his name was," his mother said. Even from where he stood, Dean could see Cato stiffen. "They're saying now that he's her cousin."

"No. He's her best friend," Cato corrected. "I can imagine it's the same reason that the cameras don't want Skye and Julie around."

"She talked about him very fondly in the Interviews," his mother said slowly.

Cato turned a heated glare on his mother. "He's her best friend," he snapped.

His mother moved forward and placed her arm on her son's shoulder. "I'm sorry, Cato. I'm not trying to make you doubt her, I'm just saying that she did have a life before you, just the way that you had a life before her. Anyone with eyes can see that the two of them clearly care about each other a lot," his mother reasoned carefully.

Cato was silent for a long time just processing what his mother had told him. When he finally spoke again, there was a defensive edge to his voice. "They've known each other for years. They helped each other keep their families alive. She cares about him. I care about Skye and Julie. That'll never change."

"They could all cause problems down the road," his mother said.

It could get complicated. Aspen and Gale with Cato and Skye and Julie. Five people in a relationship only built for two. "I know." Cato growled.

He was clearly getting angrier and angrier. "She seemed at least moderately interested in him," his mother said. Cato glared at her, clearly fed up with the conversation. "I'm sorry, I'm just concerned."

Dean knew that this was one time that Cato would have to make his own choice and be willing to potentially get his heart broken. "Whatever has happened between them, I love her. Nothing's changed that. Nothing can ever change that. She's free to do as she pleases with her life. She's free. But that doesn't mean that I won't fight for her," Cato said lowly.

A small smile appeared on Dean's face. He had never heard Cato speak like that about anyone. Not a girlfriend and not even a family member. It became very clear to Dean, in that moment, that no one would ever mean to Cato what Aspen did. No one would ever be able to live up to her. She had changed his younger brother and he didn't really mind the change. Cato had gone from a brash boy to a kind-hearted young man. He had always been that way but she had showed him that it was okay to show others. It was okay to be in love with someone.

"And would she fight for you?" his mother finally asked.

A wry grin appeared on Cato's face. "Hasn't she already?"

His mother smiled. "That's what matters. If you love her, we love her too."

Today...

As Dean finished his story, I merely stared blankly at him. I knew the point of the story. I just didn't want to have to hear it. Cato believed that I would fight for him. And I had, while we were in the Capitol and in the Games. But that was when the love had been mutual. There was nothing there now. As I had told myself a thousand times before, whatever we were, it was gone. The sooner that I accepted that and moved on, going to my promise to kill Snow, the sooner I could move on from him. Dean stood across from me in the hall, waiting for me to speak.

"Why tell me that?" I asked, already well-aware of the answer.

"I think you already know why I told you that," Dean said.

Rubbing a hand over my eyes, I shook my head. "What's the point, Dean? I have spent the past year and a half ruining his life. He's better off without me. Just look at him. They'll never be able to completely bring him back. He'll hate me forever. Whatever it was that we had, it's gone. He's better off with Skye or Julie. Not me. I've had a long history of destroying everything around me. I'm sorry that he got sucked into it," I said weakly.

His life had been so lovely before I had smashed right into it. He'd loved his entire family. His wonderful brothers, his sister and sister-in-law, and his parents. He'd had so many friends that had loved him and his strength. He had been so confident in his entire life. He had known exactly what he had wanted to do with his life. He would have made a wonderful Victor. He could have been with Skye or Julie or any of his other suitors. He had been well on his way to the perfect life - right up until the little fool from Twelve had ruined everything.

"He once told my mother that he would always fight for you. He thought that you would fight for him, too," Dean said quietly.

And if I could have, I would have. But he was lost. Fighting for him would only hurt us both. "How? I can't even speak to him without him trying to kill me. I'm not doing this for me. I love him. But his only chance for a normal life is without me around," I explained.

"I'm not trying to upset you," Dean whispered.

He walked toward me and laid a hand on my shoulder. Tears began building in my eyes. "I've never been consistently surrounded by more people in my life, but I can't ever remember feeling this alone," I said honestly, my voice cracking. "It's not fair. None of this is fair."

"War is rarely fair," Dean pointed out.

That was when I had officially had it. "Why the hell did I even get dragged into a war? I didn't want a war! No matter what Snow thinks, the last thing that I wanted was a war. I just wanted to survive. I'm barely twenty. A war should be the last thing on my mind. I just wanted to save Katniss and Prim. I wanted them to get to have their lives. Everyone attacks me for my relationships these days... No one ever realized that I had a life of my own before I met Cato. Before I went into the Games. Yes, I had Gale in my life. Yes, I loved him a lot.

"But I was too concerned with keeping myself alive to realize that there might have been something there. I was the girl who grew up without a family. I was the one who grew up with no clue how to love someone. When Cato came into my life, I didn't know how to handle it. I had always just assumed that I would grow up and marry Gale and get on with my life. Die eventually. No kids. I was just comfortable with him. But my life took a tailspin and I don't know how to handle it. I'm so sick of everyone, including Gale, thinking that he was just my second choice. I have a lot of bigger things on my mind."

"You're angry," Dean commented.

Anger was just one of the many things that I was feeling. "Damn right I'm angry," I snapped breathlessly. I couldn't remember ever being angrier. "I can't even be angry with anyone but myself. People doubted Cato and I because of Gale. I can't let go of Gale because I do love him. I know that I'm leading him on because I'm too afraid to hurt him."

"Friendships like that can be complicated," Dean said.

"Should have just stayed alone forever. I'm better off that way," I muttered.

"Aspen, it's like we've told you a thousand times. Cato loves -"

"Loved."

"I seem to recall you telling Boggs that he was gone but the love wasn't."

That was when I had thought that he'd died loving me. "Look at him when you mention anything to do with me. You tell me that the love is still there," I said.

"It is. It's buried deep, but it's still there."

"Maybe."

Even if it was there, they would spend the rest of his life trying to pull it out. Dean let out a soft breath and went into the pockets of his jacket, pulling out what appeared to be a letter. "Carrie told me to give this to you when the time was right," Dean said, handing the thick envelope off to me. "I think the time is right."

"What is it?" I asked.

"All I know is that it's a letter that Cato wrote you." When the hell had been sane enough to write me a letter? Not now, I was sure. "I'm heading back to the rebel base. Stay here as long as you need. If you ever want to talk about... what happened after the blast... I'll be here," Dean offered.

"Okay," I said.

No, I would never want to talk about what had happened after the electrical blast. That was something that I could have done with forgetting. Dean smiled at me and headed back towards the front door. I listened to his footsteps recede followed by the soft thump of the front door shutting. I gave him a few more seconds before making a slit in the envelope. Once it was opened, I pulled out the pieces of paper and looked down at them. It was long and wordy, written in Cato's messy hand.

Aspen,

It's late now. You're already asleep. As a matter of fact, you've been asleep for a while. It's a nice sight. You look at peace right now, something that I very seldom see with you. The nightmares haven't started yet. Maybe they won't tonight. Because we had a good day today. At least, a good night. It was our wedding.

I could stay up all night writing to you and still not be able to tell you everything that I want to. I don't even know where to start or where to end. All I know is that this is going to be my last chance to tell you everything that I need to before I die. I don't care what you made Haymitch promise you. I'll never say it to you while I'm alive, but I know that the promise that he made me was the real one. You're getting out of that arena. Not me. I'd say I was sorry, but I'm not. It's my last wish for you to get out of there.

It's something that I will fight for until the Games are over. I don't care who I have to kill and who I have to fight. As long as it means that you make it out of there alive, that's what matters. As long as you get to have the life that you've always deserved, I'll die a happy man. Knowing that there are people who will be looking out for you. Not that you need someone to do that. You're strong enough on your own.

But no one should ever have to be on their own. Especially not you. Not when I love you so damn much. So much that I can't even describe it. I'll try as hard as I possibly can, but I don't think that I'll ever be able to tell you every single reason that I do. But let me try.

I love the way you look at me. You don't look at me like I'm a monster or a Career. Just Cato. And that's something that I haven't felt in a long time. You make me feel like I’m the only person in the world. With you I can be myself. The two of us are family and friends at the same time. When we’re together, all my problems disappear. You make my heart smile. You've proven time and time again that you know me better than I know myself. You make me smile when nobody else can. You are the only one who can calm me down after a nightmare. Only your presence. You have taught me the true meaning of love.

When I'm hurt, you will do anything to save me. Not this time, Aspen. I'm sorry. You're always there for me, no matter what. You let me be myself and you encourage me to find more of myself. You are truthful and vulnerable with me. You make me feel like I can get through anything, as long as I have you. Because you are determined to make this relationship work. When you laugh it makes me laugh. We understand each other so well. Your arms feel more like home than any house ever did. You have an inner strength that helps keep me calm when my life is in chaos.

You always keep your promises. But this is one that you'll have to break. You have the ability to comfort me simply by your touch. Because when things don't go as planned, you roll with it, instead of getting stressed. You always believe in me and inspire me. I can always talk to you. I love you because you picked me. Your eyes smile when you laugh. You love me even when I’m being horrible and hard to be around. We're so different and yet so the same. You make an effort with my friends and family, because you know how much they mean to me.

You have an innate ability to protect and take care of me. You gave me the gift of yourself. You make me a better person. The day I met you, I found my missing piece. Because I can be myself around you. Because you trust me unconditionally. I can’t imagine life without you. You know the secret, little things that cheer me up and make me happy. You only seem to notice my strengths and always have confidence in me. You don’t just tell me you love me, you show me. You never give up on me, even when I’m at my worst. You care about the people around you.

You are my very best friend in the whole world. You’re the calm in the storm. You're always able to make me laugh, even when the situation shouldn’t be funny. You are everything I never knew I needed. You make my fears melt away. You put other’s needs before your own. Your kisses make me weak in the knees. You take care of me when I forget to. People look up to you and you never let them down. You don’t change depending on who you’re with.

There are so many more things that I can't even remember. I wish I could name them all. I'm sorry that I can't. Perhaps you'll forgive me. This isn't the end for us, Aspen. I promise you that. I'm going to watch over you from the other side and I can't wait to see where your life goes. I know that you'll do something wonderful with the many years that you have left. Because you have so many years to make your life the one that you deserve. One full of happiness and adventure. No more surviving, Aspen. Live on. For me.

Please do me a favor. Don't mourn me forever. It's not healthy for you. You can be sad for a little while. I'd be surprised if you weren't. But I know that you can heal from my loss. You can heal from anything. I've seen it for myself. You are so unconditionally strong that it shocks me sometimes. Not that it should. You are without a doubt the most powerful person that I've ever met. It's incredible. It always will be. That's why I know that you can make it through this. Maybe with a little help, but you can.

You had to have seen this one coming. Please, Aspen, be with Gale. Just the way that you would have wanted me to be with Skye or Julie had this gone the other way. I asked him tonight to take care of you. Be there for you after I die and be there for you during the healing process. When the time comes, he's promised to help you move on. He's so in love with you. Yes, your relationship with him has always made me jealous, because I know that there were always some feelings. But I was never surprised by that. You two grew up together. You thought that you would marry him.

You still have that chance. Don't marry him just because it's the right thing to do or it's time. Marry him once you really allow yourself to fall in love with him. You can. I've seen you two together enough to know that you can. But it's okay. He's good for you. He's a better man than I could ever be. He loves you. He loved you long before I ever came along and he'll love you long after I'm gone.

When it comes down to it, Gale knows you better than anyone else. Probably even better than me. He has been unconditionally there for you since the day you two met. You can't deny that the two of you have had moments. That kiss after the Games? I'm not surprised or hurt by it. He had every right to just let you know that you meant something more to him. If it’s happened again, it's okay. I couldn't ever imagine that you two would just be able to go back to normal. I put a huge strain on that relationship and I'm sorry for it.

You think that Haymitch never mentioned your plan to run away to me? I knew about it and I knew that you thought that it was the right thing to do. Maybe it was. You two could have gone off together. He was the first one to step up, wasn't he? Like I said, Aspen, I love you so much and I know that the love is reciprocated. But that doesn't change the fact that the two of you could be wonderful together. You two fight all the time. I see that. But he still respects and listens to you. Let's be honest, even when you love me, he still loves you.

Be with him, please. Be with someone who knows and loves your heart, just the way that I do.

Or Katniss, you know. Give the Capitol a real laugh.

Make it my last wish. Be with him. Make a life with someone. Have a few kids. You'd be a great mother, you know. Teach them how to hunt. All of those songs that you sing. Love someone unconditionally. Wouldn't that be nice? I would love to see you in a happy life. The one that we never got to have together, but the two of you can. Go back home to Twelve. Live in that house in Victor's Village. Enjoy your life with him.

There are so many more things that I wish I could tell you right now, but I don't have the time. The sun is starting to come up and I know that soon it will be time to start preparing for the Interviews. It'll be back to reality, unfortunately. But for now, I'll just enjoy sitting here and watching you. Did you know that you wrap a blanket around your leg when you sleep? You mumble in your sleep too. You say my name a lot. Dreaming of our nights together? Come on, I know you want to smile.

What can I even say about how much I love you? Never enough. Because I love you against reason, against promise, against peace, against hope, against happiness, against all discouragement that could be. There's no reason behind our love. It just is. It's more than that. We've loved with a love that is more than love. In fact, I don't live at all when I'm not with you. There's no greater thing for two human souls, than to feel that they are joined for life. We strengthen each other in all labors, rest on each other in all sorrows, minister each other in all pain, and to finally be one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting.

Maybe this isn't the ending of us. Maybe we're just getting started. Who knows? Maybe we'll have some luck. After all, we've gotten lucky before.

You should know that today was the best day of my life. I got the chance to get married to the love of my life before I died. I never thought that I would get to love someone like you. Perfect in every way. For me, at least. Know something. I will always love you, no matter what. There's nothing that anyone can do that will change that. It's my promise to you.

I'll see you again one day. Just make sure that it's not for a long time.

Aspen Hadley, I love you more than anything,
Cato.

For a moment, my entire body felt numb. I took extreme care in folding the letter back up the same way that it had been before and pushing it back into the envelope. I wasn't sure what to do with it. Hold it. Place it back on the table. Burn it. None of the options seemed right. I wanted to keep it and treasure the memento of Cato for the rest of my life but I also wanted it far away from me. I didn't want any memory of what had happened between the two of us. Not when we could never be the same kids that had fallen in love over a year ago.

Something snapped in my body. Something far worse than anything I had felt before. My legs buckled underneath me and I dropped to the floor with a thump, sobbing hysterically and uncontrollably. He had lied to me. In his letter and in real life. He didn't always love me. He didn't love me anymore. Not right now. He hated me more than he had hated anyone else. If someone was able to get rid of that much love between the two of us, how could they ever bring it back? The answer: they wouldn't.

"Hey..." Katniss whispered, dropping at my side. I hadn't heard her come in over my sobs. She wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me into her chest. "Aspen... it's okay. Shh... it's okay."

"He's never coming back," I wheezed.

"You don't know that. You don't. Listen to this, Aspen. He loves you so much. They can't just get rid of that. They can't," Katniss promised.

But I did know that. I did know that nothing was ever bringing him back. I had seen him long enough to know that they had permanently broken the link between us. Whatever the Tracker Jacker venom had done, rooting itself inside his brain and heart, he would never be able to get over it. Not if they had taken that much love between the two of us and eradicated itself within a few weeks. Katniss pressed a hand against the back of my head, allowing me to cry into her shoulder, as she hushed my cries softly.

We could have been together for twenty minutes or five hours. I wasn't sure. But eventually I managed to calm down. It wasn't easy but I had to keep reminding myself that Cato was gone. The love that we had shared, our relationship, and our entire life was gone. The potential child was gone. There was no point in crying over something that I could no longer control. It was over. It was time to move on and kill Snow and then die for my trouble. By the time I calmed down, the sun was already sinking below the horizon.

"Want to see something that I found?" Katniss offered quietly.

The two of us stared at each other for a few moments. She knew that I wasn't going to say anything, so she took it upon herself to act. She reached into her pocket the way that Dean had earlier and pulled out a photograph. I recognized the frame as one that had been on the side table in the entrance hall. It was of Cato. He looked to be about twelve or so. He was holding a sword in his hands and was smiling broadly at the camera. In the background, I could see Dean smiling at his little brother. Cato was so young in the photograph. So innocent.

"He looks happy," I commented softly.

"I found a picture where he looks even happier," Katniss said. She pulled out a photograph and handed it to me. It was of the two of us at our wedding and we were locked in the middle of our first dance. I was looking down at the ground as I laughed at something Cato had said. He was grinning down at me lovingly. "Look at how happy he is."

"What did he pay for it?" I replied.

It was the same thing that I had said a thousand times before. It was the same thing that he had said when I had returned from the Feast in the first Games. The two of us both sighed as I laid my head on her shoulder. Her hands reached up to run her fingers through my hair. Our hands locked together as we enjoyed the company that we had deprived ourselves of for months. We needed human contact and, at the moment, anything worked. Even just sitting with my best friend for a much-needed cry.

Suddenly I could stand the silence no longer. "I think it was a girl," I spat out.

"What?" Katniss asked.

"The baby. I think it was a girl."

Katniss glanced over and stared at me for a long time. She chose her words very wisely before saying, "That's the first time that I've heard you acknowledge that there was a baby." I nodded blankly. "Why do you think it was a girl?"

"I have dreams about it all the time," I explained.

"I didn't know that," Katniss whispered.

"What was I supposed to say?" I asked wryly.

The last thing that I wanted to talk about was the fact that I had lost a child on my own stupidity. "I'm your best friend. You could have said something to me. I'd rather you talk to me about it," Katniss said determinedly.

If there was one person that I could talk to about this, it was Katniss. She was the one person who would understand and not judge me. "For years I thought that I didn't want children. I thought that it was selfish. Having kids only to risk them going into the Games. I know how horrible they are. I don't know... I didn't even like kids," I said quietly. Prim was the only kid I'd ever been around. "But then..."

"The thought of having lost something that you never even knew you wanted is painful," Katniss answered.

I nodded numbly. "Maybe it's better this way. I don't think I could have looked at a kid and saw him and still been able to bear it," I said.

"They're still working on him," Katniss said.

"They'll be working on him for the rest of his life," I said.

"Don't think that."

"Look me in the eye and tell me that you think that he can come back."

She stared me in the eyes for a moment before saying, "I don't think that he can do it alone."

"He's not alone."

"Fine. He can't do it without you," Katniss snapped. She calmed down long enough to grab my hands and pull me into her. The way she was looking at me was like she was staring into my soul. I never could hide much from her. "You're scared of him now, aren't you?"

After the attack in the hospital wing, I had been reminded of exactly who Cato was. "When I was stung by the Tracker Jackers in my first Games, I remember seeing him coming storming up to me. Seeing how angry he was with me, knowing that he wasn't completely in control of himself, that was one of the only times that I was genuinely afraid of him. Now that he's permanently like that, all of his love for me that restrained him from killing me before gone, yeah, I'm scared of him. Feels cowardly to admit it," I said softly.

Katniss shook her head. "It's not cowardly. He was - is the love of your life," she corrected herself. "Now that he's like this... he's scary."

"I guess the sooner that I can get over him, the better," I muttered.

"You don't need to get over him. Aspen... it's been over a year since Peeta," Katniss said. I stared at her blankly. I rarely heard her even say Peeta's name out loud. "I can't - even now, I'm still not over what happened. I wish that I would have gotten a chance to really get to know him. He's dead but I'm still not completely over it. You're never going to be over Cato and that's okay. Because he still might come back to you."

"I've never heard you openly talk about Peeta," I said slowly.

Her eyes were reddening with unshed tears. "It's hard to even think about him."

"I think you two would have been good together."

"Maybe," Katniss shrugged. Perhaps one day she would be ready to talk about Peeta. It wasn't today. "You would have made a wonderful mother," Katniss eventually said.

"Thanks."

"Maybe you'll still be one."

"Not with him."

We would never lay in a bed together again. Not without him wanting to kill me. "Promise me something," Katniss eventually said.

"Okay."

"Don't give up on him yet. Give him a few weeks."

In a few weeks I was planning to be deceased. Instead I said, "Promise."

Katniss gave me a weak smile. "Come on," she said, hopping to her feet and giving me a hand up. "We should go back."

"Alright."

Today hadn't exactly made me happy, but it was something that I needed. I needed to see Cato's home. I wasn't sure exactly why, but it was important to me. The two of us walked back through Victor's Village, collected a very irritated looking Tick and Tock, and headed back to the rebel base. The only thing left to do today was try and tape a few propos. I knew from experience that they got annoyed whenever I sat around and moped. Talking to someone and pretending to listen was better than another eight hours of me crying at the sight of Cato's home.

As per usual, I didn't really do much. There was nothing to do. Not on the heavily-fortified sides of the rebel base. We mostly sat around and talked strategy, but at least it felt like I was doing something here. Today I took the time to discuss with a few of the soldiers what I had been doing over the past few weeks - particularly in the five weeks that I had remained hidden in Thirteen. I was careful not to mention the ruined District, as instructed. If there was a mole in the District 2 rebel forces, we couldn't risk the Capitol knowing that I was actually hiding in Thirteen most of the time.

In a few days, when the brains were selected, I wasn't surprised to see Gale's name on the list. I thought Beetee would bring him, not for his technological expertise, but in the hopes that he could somehow think of a way to ensnare a mountain. Originally, Gale offered to come with me to Two, but I could see I was tearing him away from his work with Beetee. I told him to sit tight and stay where he was most needed. I didn't tell him his presence would make it even more difficult for me to mourn Cato.

As much as I did love Gale, I didn't want him around while I was trying to recover from Cato's change in heart. Having him here would have made me feel like I'd have to move on. I wouldn't be able to properly mourn him and our life together. Gale hadn't looked happy when I had told him that he needed to stay in Thirteen and continue the good work he was doing there. He must have known that I just didn't want him with me, but he hadn't said anything about it. Probably because he knew just how much it hurt to talk about it right now.

Gale ultimately found me when they arrived late one afternoon, a few days after my discovery of Cato's home. I was alone. Katniss was off with Skye and Julie doing some patrols. I had wanted to be alone for the day. Something I wouldn't get any more. I was sitting on a log at the edge of my current village, plucking a goose. A dozen or so of the birds were piled at my feet. Great flocks of them had been migrating through here since I had arrived, and the pickings were easy. Without a word, Gale settled beside me and began to relieve a bird of its feathers.

We were through about half when he said, "Any chance we'll get to eat these?"

"Yeah. Most go to the camp kitchen, but they expect me to give a couple to whoever I'm staying with tonight. For keeping me," I said.

"Isn't the honor of the thing enough?" Gale asked.

"You'd think. But word's gotten out that Mockingjay's are hazardous to your health," I replied.

We plucked in silence for a while longer. Clearly neither one of us knew what we were supposed to say right now. I wasn't sure whether or not Gale knew about what had happened with Cato. He knew that he hated me, but I wasn't sure if he knew about the baby. And I didn't want to tell him. He hadn't been around when Cato had made the announcement. It was likely that someone had told me. Now it was a question of who was going to mention all of the unsaid things between us first. I knew that it wouldn't be me.

Finally, Gale said, "I saw Cato yesterday. Through the glass."

A knot formed in my stomach. "What'd you think?" I asked.

"Something selfish," Gale said.

"That you don't have to be jealous of him anymore?"

My fingers gave a yank, and a cloud of feathers floated down around us. Gale knew that we were toeing a dangerous line. "No. Just the opposite," Gale said, pulling a feather out of my hair.

"What?" I asked.

He didn't need to speak before I knew that I wouldn't like the answer. "I thought... I'll never compete with that. No matter how much pain I'm in," Gale said, not self-pitying. He spun the feather between his thumb and forefinger. "I don't stand a chance if he doesn't get better. You'll never be able to let him go. You'll always feel wrong about being with me."

"The way I always felt wrong being with him because of you," I said.

Gale held my gaze. "If I thought that was true, I could almost live with the rest of it."

"It is true. But so is what you said about Cato," I admitted. Gale made a sound of exasperation that made something in me snap. "What? Do you expect me to just get over it?"

"No, I don't expect you to just get over it," Gale said.

"So, what do you want?" I asked.

"You to just tell me the truth."

A bitter and humorless laugh escaped my lips. "My head is so fucked right now that I don't even know where to begin with the truth. Gale... I can't tell you the truth because I don't know it. I love... loved... him. But I can't lose you. And I feel like if I can't just get over myself and move on, I will lose you," I said.

Gale shook his head but made no move to touch me. "You're insane if you think that I'd just walk away from you. If I've hung around this long, been through this much with you, you're dead wrong if you think I'd leave just because you can't make up your mind. You need time. I get it," Gale said.

Be with him, please. Be with someone who knows and loves your heart, just the way that I do.

Despite his words, I was still sure that he didn't get it. He had lost people that he'd loved, but he'd never lost someone like I had. He would never know what it felt like. We didn't speak for the rest of the hunt, instead my mind kept going back to Cato's final letter to me. Asking me to be with Gale. Someone who knew my heart. That was certainly him. Cato had wanted this. I was sick of being so damned lonely. I missed having that comfort. I missed that carefree relationship that I used to have with Gale. Now I always sat, tensed and ready for a fight.

Nonetheless, after we had dropped off the birds and volunteered to go back to the woods to gather kindling for the evening fire, I found myself wrapped in his arms. I wasn't sure how we had ended up that way, but I wasn't in the mood to ask questions. I just wanted to be with someone. I wanted to listen to that desperate urge in my body, begging me to be with someone. Begging to find some type of comfort. So, I allowed Gale's lips to brush the faded bruises on my neck, working their way to my mouth. It was a mirrored action of what Cato had done to me so many times before.

They were so the same and yet so different. Despite what I felt for Cato, that was the moment when I accepted deep down that he would never come back to me. Or I would never go back to him. Never back to Thirteen. It was too painful to hear about him anyway. I would stay in Two until it fell, go to the Capitol and kill Snow, and then die for my trouble. And he would die insane and hating me. So, in the fading light I shut my eyes and kissed Gale to make up for all the kisses I had withheld, and because it didn't matter anymore, and because I was so desperately lonely, I couldn't stand it.

These were the moments that I had always been so desperate for. To close my eyes and just forget. Gale's touch and taste and heat reminded me that at least my body was still alive, and for the moment it was a welcome feeling. To close my eyes and pretend that we were those two kids watching the stars. Imagining what might have happened if we had done just this that night. I emptied my mind and let the sensations run through my flesh, happy to lose myself. When Gale finally pulled away slightly, I moved forward to close the gap, but I felt his hand under my chin.

"Aspen," he said.

The instant I opened my eyes, the world seemed disjointed. Something seemed very wrong. It took me a moment to remember myself and what had just happened. Whatever had happened between us, I knew that it wasn't right. But that didn't change the fact that I needed to do something - be with someone - to remind myself that I wasn't dead. But this... this was wrong. These were not our woods or our mountains or our way. All of it was wrong. My hand automatically went to the scar on my left temple, which I associated with confusion.

Confusion at what I had just done. Confusion over my feelings for Gale and Cato. Confusion over everything that had happened lately. Gale stared at me as if trying to read my expression, but I was sure that it was blank. The exact way that I felt. Because I realized, now that we had pulled away from each other, that I didn't feel anything. Just... empty. And that emptiness hadn't gone away yet. I knew that my body was longing for someone to be with me, but my mind reminded me that I didn't want anyone else. Just Cato. The one person I couldn't have.

"Now kiss me," Gale commanded. Bewildered, unblinking, I stood there while he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine briefly. He examined my face closely. "What's going on in your head?"

"I don't know," I whispered back.

"Then it's like kissing someone who's drunk. It doesn't count," Gale said with a weak attempt at a laugh. He scooped up a pile of kindling and dropped it in my empty arms, returning me to myself.

"How do you know?" I asked, mostly to cover my embarrassment. "Have you kissed someone who's drunk?"

I'd seen plenty of people kiss before. It was pretty typical to see wives kissing their husbands before they headed out for a day in the mines. I used to see Mr. and Mrs. Everdeen kiss all the time before he died. But it dawned on me in that moment that I had never seen Gale kiss someone. I guessed that Gale could have easily been kissing girls right and left back in Twelve. He certainly had enough takers. Everyone had thought that he was the strong and silent type. I never really thought about it much before. Gale just shook his head.

"No. But it's not hard to imagine," Gale said fiercely.

Of course. He must have remembered that I had kissed someone who was drunk. Seneca - the night I had fled his apartment in the Capitol. "So, you never kissed any other girls?" I asked, trying to change the subject.

Gale gave a wry smile. "I didn't say that. You know, you were only twelve when we met. And a real pain besides. I did have a life outside of hunting with you," Gale said, loading up with firewood.

That wasn't exactly a fair statement. We had both been twelve when we had met. I was older than Gale, anyway. But he was right. There were lots of times that Katniss was with me and Gale was nowhere in sight. I had never thought about anyone else being with Gale. That was a stupid thing to think, though. What had I been thinking? That I had always just assumed that he was waiting around for me. That was a shallow thing for me to have thought. He was desirable. He would have been a fool to wait for me. Suddenly, I was genuinely curious.

"Who did you kiss? And where?" I asked.

"Too many to remember. Behind the school, on the slag heap, you name it," Gale said.

"Katniss?" I asked curiously.

Gale was silent for a moment before saying, "I've thought about it."

I rolled my eyes. He was waiting for me to give him his answer. "So, when did I become so special? When they carted me off to the Capitol?" I asked bitterly.

"No. You know when, Aspen. It was that night," Gale said.

Yes. The night that we had spent together on my eighteenth birthday. The night that I thought I might have felt something. "I always just thought that it was in the moment," I replied.

"That's what I thought for a long time too," Gale admitted.

"When did you realize otherwise?" I asked.

"About six months before they carted you off to the Capitol. Right after New Year's. We were in the Hob, eating some slop of Greasy Sae's. And Darius was teasing you about trading a rabbit for one of his kisses. And I realized... I minded," Gale told me.

That was a day that I hadn't thought of in forever. But I remembered that day well. Bitter cold and dark by four in the afternoon. My absolute least favorite kind of day. We had been hunting with Katniss, but a heavy snow had driven us back into town. The Hob was crowded with people looking for refuge from the weather. It was warm simply because there were so many people in the crowded marketplace. Greasy Sae's soup, made with stock from the bones of a wild dog we had shot a week earlier, was below her usual standards. Still, it was hot, and I was starving as I scooped it up, sitting cross-legged on her counter.

It was disgusting, but good enough to not starve. Darius was leaning on the post of the stall, tickling my cheek with the end of my braid, while I smacked his hand away. Katniss had threatened to shoot him if he touched her. I was laughing. Darius was explaining why one of his kisses merited a rabbit, or possibly two, since everyone knew redheaded men are the most virile. And Greasy Sae and I - and even Katniss, but she would never admit it - were laughing because he was so ridiculous and persistent and kept pointing out women around the Hob who he said had paid far more than a rabbit to enjoy his lips.

"See? The one in the green muffler? Go ahead and ask her. If you need a reference," Darius had told us.

A million miles from here, a billion days ago, that happened. "Darius was just joking around," I said.

"Probably. Although you'd be the last to figure out if he wasn't," Gale told me. I raised a brow curiously. "Take Cato. Take me. Or even Finnick. I was starting to worry he had his eye on you, but he seems back on track now."

"You don't know Finnick if you think he'd love me. I reminded him of Annie, but with her spirit. Nothing else," I said.

Gale shrugged. "I know he was desperate. That makes people do all kinds of crazy things."

My head snapped over to him. We were back to him blaming me for things that were out of my control. He was back to blaming me for everything that had happened with Cato. Blaming me for speaking to him, for falling in love with him, for being willing to sacrifice everything for him. Wondering why I hadn't known that Gale truly felt something for me. All of it, my fault, as always. That was why I couldn't help but to think that Gale's last comment was directed at me. A spike of anger shot through me as I whipped back around to him.

"Why didn't you say something?" I snapped.

"What?" Gale asked, taken aback by my sudden change in demeanor.

"Why didn't you say something? When you first started thinking something different of me? When I wasn't your kid friend anymore. You should have said something!" I shouted, the anger bubbling over. "You blame me for getting together with Cato. How the hell was I supposed to know that you cared that much about me? I didn't betray you, I didn't know."

"I kissed you just before you left," Gale pointed out.

"We made a deal when we were kids that we would be each other's first kiss. You were mine, I don't know if I was yours," I explained. Gale merely shrugged. I laughed. "Of course not. I thought that you were just living up to your end of the bargain."

"You should have known," Gale muttered quietly.

"That you were too cowardly to do what you should have done? Something that could have really changed everything!" I shouted, growing angry all over again. This all could have been so different if Gale had just said something. I calmed down long enough to say, "Yes, I should have known. But if you were ever waiting for the opportune moment, that was it."

Gale stared at me for a long time. "I would have confused you even more."

"Maybe," I conceded. "But at least I would have known. This is not my fault."

"I've never said that it was."

"You certainly treat me like it is!"

"You're right," Gale admitted. I was surprised by his honesty. "I should have said something about the way that I felt about you long before you ever went into the Games. I just always thought that you cared about me enough to wait."

"I shouldn't have had to! You should have just gotten up the balls and said something!"

"Like he did?"

The coldness in Gale's gaze startled me. I nodded blankly. "Yes, Gale, like he did." My hands were shaking and my knees were threatening to cave out from underneath me. I let out a breath and pushed my hair back off my forehead. "Can we just... can we just... stop? I'm sick of this argument. I don't have the strength to keep fighting with you. My husband hates me. I - I lost... I lost a baby," I whispered, my voice cracking.

Gale's face drained of color. "What?" he breathed.

Did he not know? I thought that was the newest thing that he was mad at me for. "They didn't tell you?" I asked.

"Apparently not. The pregnancy ruse... it was real?" Gale asked carefully.

"Kind of."

Even Gale was smart enough to know that this conversation had to be broached carefully. He was silent for a long time before taking a step towards me. "Aspen -"

"Soldier Antaeus," a village guard called, standing up on the hill. "We have a room for you if you're ready."

Anything to get out of this conversation... "Yes. Thank you," I called to him.

The guard gave a brusque nod before walking off. As I moved to head up the hill, Gale laid a hand on my arm and stopped me. "What do you say? Can Soldier Hawthorne accompany you?" Gale asked half-teasingly.

"I'm not talking about it," I said defensively.

"You don't have to. I'm not asking you to," Gale said, his voice adopting a softer tone. "Just like old times. On that day that I mucked up so badly. Just let me be there for you, however you need it."

"Both of us," Katniss's voice drifted from the top of the hill.

I stared between the two of them for a moment before nodding. "Alright."

The three of us made our way out of the woods, dropped off the kindling, and made a temporary home out of the rebel base that we had been shipped to tonight. We were sleeping in a small bunker, all packed into one cot. They had offered Katniss and Gale another room, but they had decided to stay with me. We ended up chitchatting about the old days together, having one of the lightest nights that I had had in a long time. It was peaceful. But as I laid down with them, crammed together into that cot, I still had that lingering stab of longing for Cato.

Bright and early the next morning, the brains assembled to take on the problem of the Nut. I was asked to the meeting, although I didn't have much to contribute. Katniss came along, too, but I had a feeling they let her because I wanted her there. Damien, Dean, Skye, and Julie had also come. I avoided the conference table and perched in the wide windowsill that had a view of the mountain in question. Katniss sat with me, as did Skye and Julie. I suspected that they were there to try and get in a conversation with me. Felix and Marcus were both there, looking quite happy to be home.

The commander from Two, a middle-aged woman named Lyme, took us on a virtual tour of the Nut, its interior and fortifications, and recounted the failed attempts to seize it. Brutus stood with her, looking friendly enough. I had crossed paths with Lyme briefly a couple of times since my arrival, and was dogged by the feeling I had met her before. She was memorable enough, standing over six feet tall and heavily muscled. But it was only when I saw a clip of her in the field, leading a raid on the main entrance of the Nut, that something clicked and I realized I was in the presence of another Victor.

That would have explained why Brutus was so friendly with her. They had something in common. Lyme, the Tribute from District 2, who won her Hunger Games over a generation ago. Effie sent us her tape, among others, to prepare for the Quarter Quell. I had probably caught glimpses of her during the Games over the years, but she had kept a low profile. She was one of the quieter Victors. With my newfound knowledge of Haymitch's treatment, and my overall knowledge of Finnick's and my own, all I could think was: What did the Capitol do to her after she won?

Eventually it began gnawing away at me. I had to know. So, I leaned over to Skye and whispered my question. It was the first time that I had spoken to her since arriving in Two. She looked surprised but admitted to me what had happened to Lyme in a hushed tone as the presentations began. Evidently Lyme's entire family had been killed because when Lyme had won her Games, she had refused any alterations be done on her. She was tough, but she wasn't the prettiest Victor that I had ever met. The Capitol had wanted someone who was both. Even the Victors of Two weren't immune from Snow's cruelty.

When Lyme finished the presentation, the questions from the brains began. Hours passed, and lunch came and went, as they tried to come up with a realistic plan for taking the Nut. But while Beetee thought he might be able to override certain computer systems, and there was some discussion of putting the handful of internal spies to use, no one had any really innovative thoughts. As the afternoon wore on, talk kept returning to a strategy that had been tried repeatedly - the storming of the entrances. I could see Lyme's frustration building because so many variations of that plan had already failed, so many of her soldiers had been lost.

Finally, she burst out, "The next person who suggests we take the entrances better have a brilliant way to do it, because you're going to be the one leading that mission!"

Gale, who was too restless to sit at the table for more than a few hours, had been alternating between pacing and sharing my windowsill. Much like myself, Katniss had given no suggestions. We were merely watching quietly. Early on, Gale seemed to accept Lyme's assertion that the entrances couldn't be taken, and dropped out of the conversation entirely. For the last hour or so, he had sat quietly, his brow knitted in concentration, staring at the Nut through the window glass. In the silence that followed Lyme's ultimatum, he spoke up again.

"Is it really so necessary that we take the Nut? Or would it be enough to disable it?"

"That would be a step in the right direction. What do you have in mind?" Beetee asked.

"Think of it as a wild dog den," Gale continued. "You're not going to fight your way in. So you have two choices. Trap the dogs inside or flush them out."

"We've tried bombing the entrances. They're set too far inside the stone for any real damage to be done," Lyme said.

"I wasn't thinking of that. I was thinking of using the mountain," Gale said. Beetee rose from the table and joined Gale at the window, peering through his ill-fitting glasses. "See? Running down the sides?"

"Avalanche paths," Beetee said under his breath. "It'd be tricky. We'd have to design the detonation sequence with great care, and once it's in motion, we couldn't hope to control it."

"We don't need to control it if we give up the idea that we have to possess the Nut. Only shut it down," Gale said.

"So, you're suggesting we start avalanches and block the entrances?" Lyme asked.

"That's it. Trap the enemy inside, cut off from supplies. Make it impossible for them to send out their hovercraft," Gale said.

An image formed in my mind of those tapes of the Hunger Games I had watched while training for the Quell. I remembered, in a Victor from Three's Games, an avalanche had been caused near the end of the Games. It had trapped four Tributes inside. Two had died in a fight. One suffocated after being buried near the top. The other resorted to trying to dig himself out. He died from an infection caused by tearing up his hands while digging himself out. I shivered at the memory. While everyone considered the plan, Boggs flipped through a stack of blueprints of the Nut and frowned.

"You risk killing everyone inside. Look at the ventilation system. It's rudimentary at best. Nothing like what we have in Thirteen. It depends entirely on pumping in air from the mountainsides. Block those vents and you'll suffocate whoever is trapped."

"They could still escape through the train tunnel to the square," Beetee said.

"Not if we blow it up," Gale said brusquely.

Every head in the room turned towards him. Even I stared at him. I had always known that Gale had a mean streak in him. I used to find it funny. We used to agree on so many different things. But this one... this might have been going too far. I glanced around the room, trying to meet Gale's eyes, but he wouldn't look at me. His intent, his full intent, became clear crystal clear. Gale had no interest in preserving the lives of those in the Nut. No interest in caging the prey for later use. This was one of his death traps.

Chapter 16: Chapter Sixteen

The implications of what Gale was suggesting settled quietly around the room. I whipped around to stare at him for a moment, trying to gauge whether he was joking or perhaps if he was exaggerating what he meant. Maybe even if he realized the cruelty of the suggestion once he had said it. But his face never once faltered. He meant it. He meant killing everyone in that mountain. You could see the reaction playing out on people's faces. The expressions ranged from pleasure to distress, from sorrow to satisfaction.

"The majority of the workers are citizens from Two," Beetee said neutrally.

"So what?" Gale asked.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I noticed Cato's family stiffening slightly. It hadn't taken me long to notice that there was no lost love between them. I knew why. They all thought that Gale had always been a danger between Cato and my relationship. Not only that, but he had ever exactly hidden the fact that he hated everyone from Two. Gale and Cato's family had always kept their distaste for each other quiet for my own benefit. But this, suggesting mercilessly killing their own people, was bound to push someone over the edge.

"We'll never be able to trust them again," Gale continued.

"They should at least have a chance to surrender," Lyme said.

"Well, that's a luxury we weren't given when they fire-bombed Twelve, but you're all so much cozier with the Capitol here," Gale snarled.

No one needed to know Lyme to know that what Gale had said was nasty. It was something that should have never been said to anyone who was a Victor of the Hunger Games. We all knew that the presence of the Capitol always came with a rope tied around your throat. Luxury lined with poison. By the look on Lyme's face, I could see that my thoughts, and my own aggravation, were echoing in her mind. I thought that she might have shot him, or at least taken a swing. She would probably have the upper hand, too, with all her training.

Gale had no idea quite what came from being in Two. He had no idea what they went through. He had no idea how the propaganda from the Capitol was shoved down their throats from the time they were young children. He had no idea that they never realized the truth until it was too late; they were either already dead or slaves to the Capitol. And all of that was missing one crucial point. The citizens from each one of the Districts had been pulled into this fight. They had been trying to avoid this. We had just made it impossible.

"They didn't firebomb Twelve. The civilians," I clarified myself. Gale turned to me with fire in his eyes. "They got sucked into this, just like we did."

But Lyme's anger and my rational suggestion only seemed to infuriate him and he yelled, "We watched children burn to death and there was nothing we could do!"

Bile instantly rose in my throat. I had to close my eyes a minute, as the image ripped through me. It had the desired effect. Suddenly I wanted everyone in that mountain dead. I was about to say so. But then... I'm also a girl from District 12. Not President Snow. I remembered the feel of the flesh melting off of my bones in both Games. I remembered the horrible, searing pain from the fireballs. I remembered the wounded miners coming to beg Ms. Everdeen for help as they lay dying on our counter. I couldn't help it. I couldn't condemn someone to the death he was suggesting.

"Gale," I whispered, taking his arm and trying to speak in a reasonable tone. "The Nut's an old mine. It'd be like causing a massive coal mining accident."

Surely the words were enough to make anyone from Twelve think twice about the plan. I wanted him so desperately to think about what this was going to mean for the people in the Nut. Their families, desperately searching for them in the aftermath of the bombing. Women and children crying, already well-aware of what had happened, but still praying desperately that they might have been wrong. Gale knew what it felt like. Katniss knew what it felt like. I knew what it felt like. We couldn't do that to someone. Not to people who hadn't asked for this to happen.

"But not so quick as the one that killed our fathers," Gale retorted.

My stomach churned. The only sense of relief I had felt after I'd realized that Mr. Everdeen had died in the coal explosion years ago had been the thought that Mr. Everdeen hadn't suffered. The explosion had been instantaneous. He had been buried so deep in the mines that it would have killed him immediately. He hadn't had time to suffocate. But those people in the Nut would. I remembered what it felt like when the smoke had started suffocating me in the first Games. It had burned through my lungs causing me to vomit pure bile. It was worse than death. You just wanted it over with.

Katniss didn't know the feeling of nearly suffocating to death, but she did know the horror of knowing someone who had. "Think about this, Gale," Katniss whispered, looking very much like she was about to faint.

"You would condemn someone to that kind of death?" I asked Gale.

He sent me another glare. "Is that everyone's problem? That our enemies might have a few hours to reflect on the fact that they're dying, instead of just being blown to bits?" Gale asked sharply.

Back in the old days, when we were nothing more than a couple of kids hunting outside of Twelve, Gale said things like that and worse. I took part in them most of the time. Laughing about creative ways that we could have killed the people in Two. Joking over using the people in the Capitol as target practice when we didn't seem to be hunting well. Katniss had even talked about the explosions with us, even with her father's untimely death. But then they were just words. Here, put into practice, they became deeds that could never be reversed.

"You don't know how those District Two people ended up in the Nut. They may have been coerced. They may be held against their will. Some are our own spies. Will you kill them, too?" I asked Gale.

"I would sacrifice a few, yes, to take out the rest of them. And if I were a spy in there, I'd say, 'Bring on the avalanches!'" Gale replied loudly.

Everyone looked shocked at his comment, but I had known Gale long enough to know that he was telling the truth. Katniss clearly shared my thoughts. We both knew that Gale would sacrifice his life in this way for the cause - after a moment, no one doubted it. Perhaps we would all do the same if we were the spies and given the choice. I guessed that I would. I had made the decision to give my life for Cato back in the Quell. But this was killing many. Not myself. This was a cold-hearted decision to make for other people and those who loved them.

Cato had spoken to me about the Nut a few times. His entire family had explained it to me. The Nut wasn't just some mine filled with Capitol workers and Peacekeepers. There were a number of people in there who were just trying to make a salary to bring home to feed their families. Right now I could see myself in the Hob, wandering back and forth, trying desperately to sell anything to gather food just to keep us alive for another night. What if someone had bombed the Hob when I had been in it, just because I was trying to save my family?

"You can't speak for all of the people in the Nut," I told Gale.

He looked like he was getting ready to counter me when Damien stepped forward. "No. I used to work in the Nut when I was younger. Those are mostly civilian workers in there, trying to support their children. I will not condemn someone to that kind of death," Damien told Gale sharply.

"The way that you decided to condemn Twelve?" Gale shot back.

For a moment I was sure that Damien would kill Gale. "That was the Capitol's choice," Dean said, calmly but with a hint of anger that I had never seen before. "No one knew what they were planning to do."

"But they sent in hover planes from Two," Gale pointed out.

"We didn't do a damn thing to your District," Dean snapped, his anger finally getting the best of him. I stepped in between him and Gale to keep either one of them from throwing the first hit. Dean took a step back and calmed himself down. "I'm sorry that you lost it and your people, but we can't keep seeing each other as enemies. There aren't enough of us."

Gale opened his mouth to speak again when I shoved him back. "Stop it," I snapped. "We have to come up with a solution."

"You said we had two choices," Boggs told Gale. "To trap them or to flush them out. I say we try to avalanche the mountain but leave the train tunnel alone. People can escape into the square, where we'll be waiting for them."

"Heavily armed, I hope. You can be sure they'll be," Gale said.

"Because you just bombed them," I argued.

"Heavily armed," Boggs agreed, before Gale could likely say something mean to me. "We'll take them prisoner."

"Let's bring Thirteen into the loop now. Let President Coin weigh in," Beetee suggested, also trying to diffuse the situation.

"She'll want to block the tunnel," Gale said with conviction.

How did he know exactly what it was that Coin would want? That was when I realized something. I had spent so much time in my own mind in Thirteen. Either talking to Haymitch or Katniss or Seneca of any of my own team. I'd spent so much time as the Mockingjay that I'd barely had any time to be around Gale and speak with him. In the absence that we'd had from each other's lives, I supposed that Gale and Coin had become close. He'd told me as much before. While I absolutely despised Coin and her attitude, Gale trusted the leader of Thirteen and clearly had her ear.

"Yes, most likely," Beetee said, agreeing with Gale's earlier comment about Coin. "But you know, Cato did have a point in his propos. About the dangers of killing ourselves off. I've been playing with some numbers. Factoring in the casualties and the wounded and... I think it's at least worth a conversation."

The whole idea of just having a conversation to weigh whether or not we would bomb the Nut and potentially kill everyone inside was sickening. It deserved more than a five-minute conversation. These were lives that we were talking about. It was worth so much more. This wasn't good enough. There could have been upwards of a thousand people in there. Destroying that many families - just as the Capitol, Snow, and the Hunger Games had done to my family - broke my heart. This was how Katniss's father had died. It was how Gale's had. I couldn't believe that he was okay with this.

Neither one of us looked at each other. I figured that Gale was angry with me for not understanding how angry he was but I was furious with him for thinking that this was okay. We couldn't do that to someone. A few minutes passed as we all gathered around a large table centered in the middle of what appeared to be an old meeting hall. We were all there to speak about the potential bombing of the Nut. A holographic image popped up facing Lyme, who was standing at the head of the table. Coin's face eventually appeared on the hologram to give her own opinion on the bombing.

"President Coin, we're indebted to you for the reinforcements and the Mockingjay," Lyme said. Coin nodded her agreement. I awkwardly looked to the floor. I'd done nothing while I was here. "But I'm not sure that anyone outside of Two knows what we've been up against. This is the Nut." A holographic image of the Nut appeared in the center of the table for Coin to see. "The Capitol's headquarters for all offensive operations. It's manned by both military and civilian personnel from District Two. As you can see, the fortress lies so far beneath the bedrock, it's untouchable. Yesterday, we attempted to take the northeastern gate. The enemy countered from higher up and we were forced to pull back. We took heavy losses."

Even after being a Victor, where I could only imagine what she had seen, she was still a general. She could never stand having to lose her own people. "Could we create a decoy?" Homes asked. He began pointing at the hologram of the Nut. "Send troops towards one gate, launch a staggered attack on another."

"Whose troops do you propose as a decoy, Commander?" Paylor asked sharply.

"We have the Mockingjay. Don't underestimate her. We could use her to erode support," Coin said.

Thankfully no one looked at me, but it didn't matter. I knew this would turn back to me at some point. I swallowed thickly, staring at the hologram of the Nut, pretending to be examining it. The one thing I was terrible at was trying to sway people. I had never been good at speeches. They always either got people killed or got me in even more trouble. I would need the line fed to me word for word. Just as it was always done. Katniss laid a hand on the edge of my thigh, likely sensing my discomfort.

"She may be able to sway some of the loyalists," Coin continued.

"You've been underground a long time, Madam Coin," Lyme said. Coin merely smiled at her disbelievingly. "This isn't like the rest of Panem. Support for the Capitol runs deep here."

She was telling the truth. Plus, District 2 had never liked me. Not after Cato had essentially betrayed them by protecting me and abandoning Clove. "Then there is no sacrifice too great. We need to control the arsenal inside that fortress. Even with every District in this alliance, we are outgunned," Coin pointed out.

"I won't commit my people to a ground assault just to pillage weapons," Paylor said determinedly.

"Commander Paylor, your people have suffered more than just about anyone else at the hands of the Capitol," Coin said.

"Which is why I won't condone a mass suicide," Paylor shot back.

That was one of the reasons that I had always liked Paylor a lot more than I had ever liked Coin. There was something about her. She wasn't willing to just do anything to win the war. She wasn't willing to sacrifice innocent people. That was very different from what Coin was willing to do. She didn't care what it took or who she had to sacrifice. Winning the war was the big picture in her book. It reminded me of the way the people in the Capitol thought. It was the main reason that I didn't trust her and likely never would.

"If we don't take District Two, we won't get into the Capitol," Coin told Paylor sharply.

"Would it be enough to disable the fortress instead of taking it?" Gale asked suddenly.

We were back to Gale's plan. I had been so hoping that this wouldn't happen. Everyone looked over at him in surprise. He was just a soldier. It was shocking that he would speak out in such a high-profile meeting. "What do you have in mind?" Lyme asked, mostly for Coin's sake.

"You think of it like a wolf den. You're not gonna fight your way in, so you've got two choices. You trap the wolves inside, or you flush 'em out. If we can't attack straight on, then couldn't we use our hovercraft to strike around it?" Gale asked, motioning around to the face of the Nut. "We'll use the mountains. We'll hit weak spots in the peaks."

"We could design the bomb targets in sequence using seismic data," Beetee told him.

"Trigger avalanches," Paylor put in.

"Block all exits, cut off their supplies. You make it impossible for them to launch their hovercraft," Gale added.

"Bury them alive," Paylor finished.

Unable to stop myself, I turned to stare at Gale. He really wasn't seeing where the problem was in all of this. He didn't understand that this wasn't something we could do. We would be destroying so many innocent lives. Katniss was staring at Gale, too. She, just like me, couldn't stand the thought of that many people being hurt because of something we had done. Everyone was looking back and forth at each other, clearly now wondering if this was what we really could do. Would it be worth it? The looks on Cato's family's face was nothing short of horrified.

They clearly couldn't even believe that we were humoring the conversation. "We'd forfeit any chance to control the weapons," Coin said.

"Yes, but we'd face a weakened Capitol," Beetee added.

My head was spinning slightly. I needed to say something. I needed to stop this. But I couldn't force the words from my throat. "There are civilians in there," Boggs said, almost over the top of Beetee. I turned to him gratefully. If I couldn't say it, at least he could. I decided to go ahead and like Boggs even more. "They should be given a chance to surrender. Could use one of the supply tunnels for the evacuees."

"It's a luxury we weren't given when they firebombed Twelve," Gale said, staring down at the table.

Perhaps that was true, but we couldn't always be playing to get even with each other. That had been the problem for so many years. We always wanted to get back at each other. I had even wanted to get back at the male Tribute from District 2 before my first Games because of what had happened to my parents. At least, until I realized who he was. But if we kept playing like this, we would destroy ourselves. The Games would never end. We would always be trying to get even with each other. It had to stop before we destroyed ourselves.

So, I turned to Gale and stared up at him. He refused to look at me. "There's gotta be a better way," I told him sharply.

Gale completely ignored me. "I suggest we try the avalanche, but leave the train tunnel alone," Coin said. I stared at the screen, horrified. We were really going to do it... We were going to bomb those people. There would be some who would die on impact. We couldn't save everyone. "Civilians can escape into the square, where our armies will be waiting for their surrender."

"We should have every available medic standing by," Paylor said.

Lyme hadn't once looked away from Coin. "And if they won't surrender?" she asked.

Coin merely smiled. "Then we will need a compelling voice to persuade them."

Of course. Me. They wanted me to try and sway them all. But I couldn't. I didn't know what I was supposed to say. Honestly, what was it that I was supposed to say? I wasn't sure. Just tell them that we had to work together to end the Games? They loved the Games. Or, even if they had gotten over their love of the Games, they hated me too much. They hated what I had done with Cato. They hated the kind of person that I had turned him into. Right now, I also hated myself. How could I make them follow me? I was a joke.

When the time came to make the ultimate choice, after a long bought of arguing and many rude comments exchanged, the number of people allowed in were dwindled down. Only a handful of people were invited to be part of that conversation. Gale, Katniss, and I were released with the rest. Cato's family were also dismissed. I was fine with that. I didn't want to be responsible for what they were going to do. Katniss and I took Gale hunting so he could blow off some steam, but he wasn't talking about it. Probably too angry with us for countering him.

That was fine by me. I couldn't believe how cold he was being about the entire thing. I knew that he was hurting from what had happened in Twelve. It killed me inside to know how many people had died because of something I had done. It always would. But that didn't change my feelings about this. Those people in there were innocent. Even if they weren't, we couldn't keep doing this. We were all defending our own lives and our own Districts. We weren't thinking about the simple fact that we were all people and we all deserved to live.

When it came down to it, even the people in the Capitol were innocent - with the exception of those who worked directly with the Games. We all had to start looking at each other like allies or it would only be a short time before we either killed ourselves off or managed to completely destroy the rebellion. Those weapons were going to be useless if there was no one left to work them. Gale didn't seem to understand that. He didn't understand that those kids who had died in the flames in Twelve... Kids and their families just like that were in the Nut. We were doing the same thing to them.

The hunting trip was a little useless for all three of us. Katniss appeared to be shaking too much to actually make a shot. If there was someone who hated what Gale was suggesting even more than I did, it was her. She was sick of the killing and fighting. I knew exactly where she was coming from. I had suggested her to merely walk with us after a stray arrow had nearly gone through my foot. She had agreed. Eventually, I had suggested that she just go back to the Justice Building. She looked like she was about to pass out anyway.

It had left just Gale and me for about an hour, wandering around the woods. Neither one of us made an attempt to speak to each other. It wasn't because we were focused on hunting (we had only picked off a few squirrels, far below our usual haul). It was because we were both too angry with the other to force a conversation that we knew would turn into a fight. I had a feeling he was also still trying to process my admission that I had been pregnant before the Quell. Probably angry at me for that, too. I couldn't bring myself to care.

Eventually, we were called back into the Town Square as the sun began to set. Hours had passed since that first meeting and, as far as I knew, the choice still hadn't been made. They would have to wait until the sun was down for the attack anyway. They couldn't be seen by the Capitol hovercrafts. I watched the Nut as I sat on the steps of the Justice Building. Maybe I was waiting to see the bombs fall. Would they even tell me their choice? They seemed to only tell me things when they actually needed something from me.

The only good thing right now was that everyone left me to my own devices. My guards stayed with me but at my insistence, they did give me a little bit of space. It left me to merely kick my booted feet against the rubble. How many times had Cato climbed these steps? Had he climbed them a few months ago, determined to volunteer and save my life? If he was here right now, would he kill me on them? I placed my head in my hands as the tears threatened to fall again - over Cato or the potential bombing, I wasn't sure. All I knew was that I was glad I was alone.

Speaking to someone was the last thing that I wanted to do right now. If I started speaking, I wasn't sure that I would be able to stop. All I would want to do was scream at them. I assumed that everyone was too busy thinking about what came next. Gale was likely trying to fight his way back into the meeting to talk to Coin. He would listen to her and vice versa. Katniss was likely trying to take a walk and clear her head. I wished that I could do it as easily as she could. When it came down to it, though, this was bound to haunt her too.

We were the two people who could never stand for injustice, no matter who it was against. Perhaps it was because we knew what it was like. We knew what it was like to lay in the freezing mud and almost die. We knew what it was like to practically be beaten to death. We knew what injustice was like. We had felt it every day back in Twelve. There was no way that we could stand to see it. Not when the consequences were like this. Not when we were really talking about people's lives in the balance. This was a war but we were still human. We couldn't kill each other.

The entire thing was disgusting. I didn't understand how we were even talking about this right now. I didn't get it. Gale was my best friend. I knew his heart. I knew that he had a good heart. But was it limited to the people he loved? Could he not feel empathy for people he had never considered? The few in District 2 who were cruel didn't mean that they all deserved to die. Gale didn't seem to understand that. There was one thought that chilled me to the core. His plan was familiar to me. Because it was something a Gamemaker would have done.

As I sat on the steps, furious with myself for not saying anything and for Gale for even offering his brutal plan, there was a sudden bombing that rocked the landscape. I jumped at the sudden noise and ducked down against the stairs. My guards turned back with the weapons tensed but very quickly relaxed. They must have been used to the bombings. But a stroke of fear shot through me. Had they decided to begin the attack without letting me know what the final choice was? I glanced out to the Nut but it appeared to still be perfectly intact.

My eyes were still shooting back and forth as I tried to find where the hell the bombing had come from. "Don't worry. It's just how the loyalists say good morning," a feminine voice called.

My gaze turned to the owner for a voice. For the briefest moment, I thought that it was just another soldier. But I quickly realized that it wasn't. It was a girl about my own age. She had stern dark eyes and dark hair, tied back in a bun against the base of her neck. Freckles were scattered across her face. Her stern eyes relaxed slightly to give me a practically teasing grin. She reminded me of Johanna. But she reminded me of someone else even more. Clove, the female Tribute from District 2 in my first Games. It was Dara, her older sister.

"Dara..." I whispered disbelievingly.

Her lips turned up in a bitter grin. "Ah, so the Mockingjay remembers someone as inconsequential as me?" Dara quipped.

It sounded as though she had inhaled a lot of smoke recently. I stared at Dara for a long time. It had been a little over a year since the last time I had seen her on the train platform coming home from the first Games. I had gone to apologize to her for Clove's death, which hadn't gone over well. She had essentially blamed me for getting Thresh to kill Clove for me since I couldn't do it myself. Her insult to him hadn't gone over well and I had attacked her, only to be pulled away by Cato, who had then threatened her. That was the first and only time I had met her.

"Are you with the rebels?" I asked curiously.

Was she planning on attacking and killing me? I couldn't have blamed her. But the thought of Dara, Clove's sister, being a rebel was an odd one. "Believe it or not, I am. Most of the stone workers in Two are with the rebels," Dara said.

The idea of Dara being on the same side was somewhat comical. I hummed in surprise. Not necessarily against the loyalists, but they were with each other, which technically put them on my side. She was still staring at me with her lips quirked up into a somewhat wry smile. It was a big change from the last time I had seen her. Her gaze had been completely stone cold. Or furious. I'd left her with a blossoming fat lip and bruised face. Looking at her now, I saw the similarities between herself and Clove. They could have been the same person, had Clove's skull not been permanently caved in.

Her bloodied sister's image forced me to close my eyes for a moment. She grinned, likely well aware of what I was thinking. "Let's put it this way, I hate you," she chirped happily.

"Yeah, I figured," I said honestly. My death was likely the only thing that would ever make us even. "And I don't blame you."

"Most people here hate you," Dara added.

"Figured," I said.

It didn't take a genius to know that she was trying to bait me into saying something nasty. Either that or she was deliberately trying to dig the knife in a little deeper. Maybe she wanted to see just how far she could push me. The answer to that was going to be surprisingly short. I wasn't sure how much longer I could handle all of this. Dara must have known that she wasn't going to get to me right now. She was very much like her sister in that matter. She couldn't just go for the kill. She had to toy with her victim first. Make them angry before she pounced.

"We hear Cato's back from the Capitol," Dara said. I gave a twitch that I hoped was imperceptible. She glanced around. "Where is he?"

My throat closed slightly. I forced all emotion out of my voice. "He's safe. Back in Thirteen, undergoing extensive rehabilitation treatments. You saw how terrible he looked in those last few interviews with Caesar Flickerman. He's got a long road to recovery ahead," I said automatically, a slightly cold tone to my voice.

Dara merely stared at me for a long time. "Hmm..."

"What?" I snapped.

"For someone who loves their husband as much as you do, you seem a little emotionless talking about him. You lost a child with him. You were separated from him for weeks and he was tortured," Dara said. Her lips turned up slightly. She must have been noticing my stance getting more and more tense with each comment that she made. She knew something was wrong here. "Aren't you happy to have him back?"

"Yes, of course," I said automatically.

For those few minutes, before I had seen him, I was thrilled. But that had all changed very quickly. "I see," Dara said slowly, nodding at me. "You sound happy."

"What are you getting at?" I hissed.

Dara put up her hands in a defensive position. "Nothing, Mockingjay. Just seems strange that you talk about Cato kind of like you're trying to… not actually think about him," she said.

If this was all that she was going to do to me, I wanted her far away from me. Because unfortunately, she was quite correct. Any time that I talked about Cato or our life together, I tried to not really think about him. I just gave the automatic response that I had already written out for myself. It was bad enough, thinking about our old life together. The way that we had used to love each other. This was a new nightmare that I was living. But it was a nightmare that I had to live internally. This wasn't one that I could share with the people of District 2. They would lose any sympathy for me they had.

As Haymitch had said a number of times before, the people of District 2 only liked and sided with me because they thought that Cato was still in love with me. They loved their boy and were more than willing to adore whoever he did. If they found out that Cato had gone through what he had because of me and that he now hated me more than anything else, there was a good chance that they would immediately defect from me. They would go right back to their previous loyalty to the Capitol. We couldn't afford that right now.

"It's hard to see all of this every day," I said, motioning around me. I had to say something. I just wasn't sure what to say to convince her that things were okay. "My life is emotional enough. I don't need to cry over everything."

"Right," Dara said slowly. Her lips turned up again in another wry smile. "Is that it or are you getting a little closer to your cousin?"

If there was something that I couldn't stand, it was people who continued talking about the Cato/Gale/me situation. "What the hell do you want? Another black eye?" I sneered.

"The truth," Dara shot back.

"I'm telling you the truth," I hissed. In a way, I was telling her the truth. But she knew that she wasn't getting everything out of me. "Cato is back in District 13 undergoing extensive -"

"Rehabilitation after everything he endured in the Capitol," Dara repeated tonelessly. She merely glared at me for a moment. "Yeah, so we've heard. But I haven't heard anything else about him. About your conversations." She was right. Cato had been rescued, it had been announced, and then it had been radio silence from us about his condition. No one outside of Thirteen knew what was going on. "Has he told you anything about his time there?"

If we were close enough to speak to each other, Cato would kill me. I cleared my throat and said, "He doesn't like to talk about it and I don't want to push."

Dara hummed thoughtfully. "Must be some very awkward conversations."

"I think everything is these days," I said truthfully.

"Honestly, when did the two of you ever have lighthearted conversations?" Dara asked.

At the end of the day, we had just been two kids in love. We'd just wanted to be together. There were so many conversations that we'd had in the darkness of the night, just the two of us, laughing and harassing each other. Those conversations that had seemed so meaningless to me at the time but now meant the world. Because I knew I could never get them back. All of those talks about fighting over what our house would be decorated in (not blue), the kinds of pets we would have (he wanted a dog, I threatened to cook it), and him insisting that he could teach me to dance.

All of those nights that I could never get back. Those conversations that would never come to light. "Probably more often than you'd think," I admitted to Dara quietly.

There was one night in particular that I was thinking of. One of those nights that I wished I could go back to. A moment that I could live in forever. A moment where I wondered what would have happened if I had known what was coming. It was the second day after training during the Quarter Quell. Our wedding had been announced the day before. We were currently trying to hide from any reporters who wanted to ask us a million questions about a wedding we hadn't been involved in. We were laying in bed together, twiddling our thumbs with each others.

"What are you doing?" I laughed as Cato crushed my thumb with his own.

Cato stared at me. "It's called a thumb war." I merely stared at him. "You've never played this game before?"

"Guess not," I admitted.

"It's easy. You just take your hands, wrap them together, and try and pin the other person's thumb for five seconds," Cato said, wrapping our hands together and holding his thumb straight up.

He nudged me to do the same. "Is everything a competition in District 2?" I asked curiously.

Even a simple children's game had been turned into a competition back in his home. "You're just asking that because you know you're going to lose," Cato teased.

If there was one thing he knew, it was that I hated being told that I would lose at something. "I am not!" I barked indignantly. Cato smiled. "Okay, fine, let's play."

He switched sides with our thumbs three times before starting the competition. I found immediately that I wasn't very good at this game. My thumbs were too short compared to his. Plus, his were much stronger. The only benefit that I had was that my nails were long and rather sharp. I could dig them into his palm. But each time I did that, he increased his grip on my hand, grinding the bones together. I almost always let up on his palm after that. When it came down to it, he was stronger and had bigger hands. There was no way I was winning. It took him almost three minutes to permanently push his thumb over mine, practically crushing it.

My nail was getting pressed down into my hand. "Ow!" I hissed, ripping my hand back away from his.

That was a terrible game for kids to play... "See?" Cato said, grinning proudly at himself. I rolled my eyes. "I win."

"That's just because you have big-ass hands," I huffed.

Cato grinned again. "You know what they say about big hands."

"No?" I asked curiously.

Cato's face fell as he stared at me. Eventually, he started laughing. I narrowed my gaze. I hated being laughed at. "You're so unbelievably innocent, it's pathetic."

"Don't be an ass," I snapped.

I was not that innocent. I had just crawled out of a shower with Cato, after all. It had just all come a little later to me than it had to him. "Do you want to know what it means?" Cato offered.

"Sure," I said.

Cato pulled me up against his chest, tangling ourselves into the sheets even further, as he leaned down. His mouth gently brushed against his ear as he whispered the real meaning of the big hand's comment. For a moment I merely stared at him. He had to be kidding. There was no way that he was telling me the truth. I stared at him, waiting for him to start laughing at my naivety, but he merely grinned even wider. Suddenly a blush formed on my face, spreading all the way from the tips of my toes to the roots of my hair. Cato laughed at my embarrassment.

"You're making that up," I finally said.

Cato laughed, shaking his head. "I am not, ask anyone."

"And who am I going to ask? Finnick Odair?" I teased.

"I'm sure he'd be more than happy to tell you," Cato shot back.

The last thing that I needed was Finnick Odair telling me about anything he did after dark. I arched a brow and moved into him playfully. "How about if I'd rather have you show me?" I teased, moving into him.

Cato gave me a twisted grin. "Oh, I'd be honored to show you that."

There was no doubt that he wouldn't want to show me something like that. He had wanted to since the moment we had meant. From that first moment, he had stood in between my legs and threatened to kill me. There had always been sexual tension between the two of us. It was a kind that I had never felt before. It was the kind that warmed me to the core and made my toes curl underneath my feet. It was the kind that I had only ever been comfortable exploring with Cato, and I would only ever be comfortable exploring with him.

Distracting me from my thoughts, I laughed as Cato grabbed me around the waist and rolled me down underneath him. His hands were tight enough to leave bruises but I didn't dare ask him to let me go. Not when I knew that this would likely be one of the final times that we could be together. For a moment I thought that we would go back to what we had been doing earlier, but we didn't act on our urges for once. Instead, we just enjoyed the peaceful air between the two of us, laying close together, fitting ourselves against one another.

We were silent for a long time before I couldn't sit in silence any longer. "Do you ever wonder what would have happened if we’d grown up in each other’s District?" I asked curiously.

Cato hummed quietly. "Never really thought about it, I suppose. I always liked that you were from Twelve. Differing world views," Cato said. Yes, we really were from two different worlds. But I had always been curious, what would have become of us if we were from the same place. Would we have gotten along or hated each other? "But if you were from Two… I don’t know."

"Come on. Tell me," I goaded.

"I think we would have hated each other," Cato admitted.

Despite what he had just admitted, I barked out a little bit of laughter. "Really?"

"Yes," Cato said, smiling at me. "I think that we would have constantly competed against each other. Best swordsman, best knife thrower, best archer; the likes of that. I was stronger. You had better aim." Very true. "I was a better planner. You were smarter." Also true. "I acted on impulse. You were patient." That one was only sometimes true. "We would have constantly butted heads. You would have been humble, I would have been proud. You would yell at me, I would laugh while you got riled up."

All of those things were so true about both of us. We had constantly competed against each other before the first Games. Who had gotten the higher training score, who had gotten more Sponsors, and who had the audience liked more. He was stronger than me but my aim with knives and arrows was much better. He did tend to plan ahead, but I was smarter about things. He did act on impulse, because of hunting I had trained myself to wait things out. We had butted heads so much at that point. He was always smirking where I had constantly second-guessed everything.

That entire imagination of our life in District 2 sounded very familiar. "Sounds like us before the first Games," I said, echoing my thoughts.

"Exactly," Cato said.

"Do you think it would have changed?" I asked curiously.

Cato smiled, brushing my wet hair back off my forehead. "Yeah. I think one day we would have ended up in the Academy together, after hours. We would start snapping at each other again and something would happen. Someone would say something to make the other look at them in a different light. Things would change after that," Cato said quietly.

It was just an echo of what had happened to the two of us in real life. We had hated each other before the first Games had really gotten underway. It hadn't been any real love between the two of us for a long time. But something had gradually shifted between the two of us from that night at Snow's party. Then things had changed even further once we had wound up on the rooftop garden the night before the Games. We had spoken to each other like the oldest of friends and had realized that we were both real human beings with friends and families. That was the first love we'd felt between us.

That was the beginning of the end. That was when things had so desperately changed between us. "Who would make the first move?" I asked curiously.

I wasn't even sure who had made the first move in real life. Cato had certainly been bolder and kissed me first, but I knew that I had played into him long before. "Me," Cato said confidently. I laughed quietly. "Because you would be trying to deny your feelings."

It all sounded familiar. "Sounds like a nice story," I whispered.

Cato turned to look at me. A small smile crossed his lips. "It’s got a happy ending," he whispered back, pressing his mouth against my temple.

"What’s the ending?" I asked curiously.

Cato merely stared at me for a moment before his lips turned up in a wry smile. "I don’t know yet," he admitted. At least he was being honest. "But I know that we’re always together."

When it came down to it, I supposed that was the important thing. The simple fact that we were always together. Perhaps we would end up in that Meadow together since we very simply weren't going to be able to be together in real life. Not after everything. At least we had the chance to end up together in the afterlife. Maybe it would be peaceful. I leaned over to kiss Cato, our kiss becoming deeper and deeper as the minutes ticked by. His hands wrapped completely around the back of my neck and rested there possessively.

We broke apart after a long time together. "What about if I was from Twelve?" Cato asked me quietly.

I was silent for a moment before saying, "You would have gotten eaten by a bear."

There was a good chance that he really would have gotten eaten by a bear. He was a little too bold and brave. He likely wouldn't have realized that he would have had to be careful in District 12. There was a good chance that he would have walked right into a bear's den and gotten himself killed. Cato merely stared at me for a moment before my lips broke out in a small smile. We both immediately started laughing. I loved being annoying when Cato was trying to be nice. He grabbed me around the waist, tackling me back in the bed, getting a little bit closer.

In the present day, in the ruins of Cato's old home, I found that I was crying. My face immediately started burning with embarrassment. I was sick of crying and looking like a fool. It was time for me to be the stone-cold Mockingjay I had promised President Snow I would be. I brushed the stray tear out of my eyes and set my jaws together, looking out into the distance. Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see that Dara was staring at me with something that looked just the slightest bit like sympathy. Not quite, but close. It was the nicest I'd ever seen her.

When she spoke next, I noticed that she was very careful with her words. "He's back. Shouldn't you be happy?"

If he was back to normal, I would have been thrilled to have him back. I would have never let him out of my sight. We would have laid up in bed for a long time and never dared let go of each other. There was no way I would have ever left the bedroom. That was the only good thing about the two of us being in the state we were in. He was so terrible that I had to do something else to take my mind off what was happening with him. It meant that I was completely focused on being the Mockingjay and nothing else.

Dara was still staring at me as my mind wandered off toward the life that Cato could have had. The life that I had unfairly taken from him. I stared at her. For once, I saw someone human. She looked heartsick for me. She likely also knew how tough it was to lose someone she loved. She had lost Clove just the way I had lost Cato. I thought on it for a moment before deciding that I might as well tell Dara the truth about what had happened to Cato. For some reason, I trusted her not to say anything. It was obvious that she knew something was wrong with us anyway.

"He's not the same," I whispered quietly.

"Not the same?" Dara asked curiously.

A lump formed in my throat. I swallowed, forcing myself to be stone cold about the entire thing. "The Capitol put him through a process called hijacking," I said tonelessly. Dara merely stared at me, her eyes asking what her mouth didn't. "They take Tracker Jacker venom and inject him with it while showing him audio and visual clips and cues. Of the two of us mostly. They distorted his memories, associating them with feelings of fear and anger rather than love or contentment, at least."

Dara merely stared at me, likely trying to gauge whether or not I was joking. I wished that I was. She would know soon enough that this wasn't a joke. Cato really hated me and would always. His family was wrong. Everyone was wrong. There was no way that we could pull out whatever it was that the Capitol had done to him. When it came down to it, we didn't even know the full extent of what it was that they had done to him. We had no idea exactly how it had worked. We didn't even know where to start. But I did. This began and ended with my death.

"What does that mean?" Dara asked, finally finding her voice.

"All of his memories of me have been altered. He believes that I'm a mutt," I said, my voice cracking slightly. I cleared my throat and continued. "He's terrified of me. When he first was rescued he tried to kill me. The Capitol let us take him with Snow hoping that I would insist on a private reunion. Had we gotten it, Cato would have killed me."

My entire body was numb with the truth of the matter. We would never again be those two kids who laid in bed and joked around. Played silly little games or teased each other. Things were too hard. Our entire life was so twisted. Everything that could have been was snatched from us. Even the possibility of being young parents, still growing up as we raised our own family, had been taken. That conversation had been one of the final ones that we'd gotten like that. But I had always thought... hoped... that we could have somehow ended up like that again.

Two kids with nothing more to worry about than their love for each other. How could the Capitol have taken that from us? We had never wanted this. Only each other. I realized that my throat was closing up again and choking me, just as it always did when I was on the verge of tears. I swallowed them back and turned to look at Dara. She was staring down at the ground, seemingly thinking on my words. She remained silent for a long time. Unless I was wrong, she looked just the slightest bit sorry for what I had just told her.

When she spoke again I was surprised at how soft her voice was. "Can it be undone?"

"They're trying, but it seems highly unlikely," I admitted.

The two of us stared at each other for a moment. I took in a deep breath, trying to keep the emotion out of my voice. Thinking about the change of my life with Cato only made things worse. "He hasn't calmed down at all in Thirteen?" Dara asked carefully.

"No. If anything, he's worse. He insists that I'm a mutt and I need to be killed. He's being locked in a padded room with restraints constantly on him. He can't even speak to anyone who reminds him of me. It sends him off into a state of panic. He hasn't been able to see his friends or family since returning," I told her.

Dara swallowed. I assumed she had gotten on rather well with Cato as kids. It must have been hard to hear about her childhood friend like this. "It's that bad?" Dara asked disbelievingly.

"He's not himself. Likely never will be completely himself again," I said quietly.

There was no way that Cato would ever be back to normal. He was so far away from the man I had fallen in love with so long ago. He was so far away from the Career I had met. There was nothing of the old Cato left. I watched Dara out of the corner of my eyes. She was sitting on the stair right below me. She looked like she might have felt a little bit bad for me. But there was no way. She hated me. She felt bad for Cato, more than likely. I didn't want to be pitied anyway. The entire thing was my own fault.

"He looked bad. Erratic. We thought that it was just physical abuse," Dara finally said.

"No… it was so much worse," I replied.

It was so much worse than any of us had expected. No one had really known the extent of the torture before he had arrived back in Thirteen. Apparently, he had talked to the doctors in Thirteen about what had happened to him in the Capitol. They had all offered to tell me what had happened to him, but I had refused to listen. I didn't want to know about all of the pain I had caused him. It was selfish, but I couldn't know. I didn't want to know. I just wanted him to get to his old self with me nowhere near his life, no longer destroying it.

"You know, one of the reasons I always hated you was because I hated how sappy the romance was," Dara said. I merely stared at her. I supposed that I deserved her insulting me. I was much of the reason that her sister was dead. "But I always kind of liked watching it. It fascinated me. I'd never seen someone that in love. I always thought it was an act. But I guess it's not."

"No, it never was," I said quietly.

She hummed understandingly. "The only reason I was ever content with Clove dying was that at least two people who genuinely hated the Capitol, who had the power to bring it down together, had won," she said quietly.

My stomach wrapped itself into knots. That wasn't what either one of us had ever wanted. We'd just wanted to be left in peace. We'd just wanted to get our lives together without any interruption. But it was clear that it wasn't happening. Particularly not right now. Clove hadn't died for nothing. I could promise Dara that much. I would bring down the Capitol. I genuinely hated them. We had loved each other at one point, each of us more than anything else. But it was gone now. All that was left was the promise to bring down the Capitol and kill Snow.

My stomach was fluttering with nerves and disappointment. "We have to keep him in complete isolation. We can't risk having him hurt someone or send any pro-Capitol messages out there," I told Dara.

Dara nodded thoughtfully. "I've known Cato a long time."

"Probably since you were kids, I guess?" I said.

She nodded again. "Yeah. The two of us never really got along, but I always admired him. Tough inside and out. No one could sway him. He was the epitome of an Academy student and soon-to-be-Victor," Dara explained. I nodded at her. That sounded like the Cato I had met. "But I remember seeing him after he fell in love with you. Softer. More of a family man. He went from a young boy who loved the idea of being a Victor to an adult who didn't give a damn about them. He just wanted to keep his wife safe."

"He did a good job for a long time," I said quietly.

"They might be able to fix him," Dara said, almost reassuringly.

It was one of the nicest ways someone had spoken to me in months. "I won't bet on it," I said quietly.

"Do you think he'd give up on you?" Dara asked.

My throat tightened. "No," I answered truthfully. "But I can't take any more disappointment."

Dara looked like she was tempted to throttle me. Which she very likely was. "And what about him? When they broke his body and his mind, do you think that he ever just gave in? Thought 'I can't do this anymore'? You think he ever just gave up?" Dara asked sharply. I said nothing, already well aware of the answer. "He didn't. He was willing to do anything and go through anything to save you. And he did. Your turn."

But I couldn't... I was just making his life worse... "Dara -"

"I know that you're hurt right now," she interrupted me sharply. That was the understatement of the century. "I know that this entire thing hurts. But too damn bad. It's war. You owe him this much. Just try."

"If you saw him -"

"Get up and help him," Dara demanded harshly. She must have been closer with Cato than she had admitted. Either that or she just hated me feeling sorry for myself. Maybe a little bit of both. "Small steps. But something has to give. Crawl first. Walk next. One day you might just find that you're running again."

If it ever got to the point that I could speak to Cato without him trying to kill me... "Do you still think about Clove?" I asked Dara curiously.

If I could never get over Cato, would I think about him every day for the rest of my life? "Every day," Dara admitted. I nodded. I guessed that it was actually kind of nice to know that Dara really did love Clove, who had always seemed so tough during the Games. "The ones that we love never truly leave us. They're right there, watching over us. Hoping that we make the right choices."

Back in Thirteen in the early days of my rescue from the arena, before I had known that Cato was still alive, I had thought about him every day. My thoughts were never anywhere else. They were only on him. Even now, I was always thinking about him. Everything seemed to tie back to him. But it was Dara's last words that echoed in my head. The ones we love never truly leave us. My mother and father. Mr. Everdeen. Cinna. Leah. Rue, Peeta, Thresh, and Finch. Mags and Wiress. Madge and her family. All of those before and after them.

Were they all watching them? Everyone who I had known and lost in my life... Was there a chance that they were all watching every move I made? I still imagined Peeta whenever things started getting hard for me. Perhaps they were all looking down on me and trying to convince me not to give up on Cato. Maybe they were saying that he was still down there. I just had to get him out. I knew that they would have been right to tell me that. Cato wouldn't have given up on me. He would still be fighting for me. I needed to get the hell up and fight for him.

The right thing to do was tell Dara that I wouldn't give up on Cato. I knew that she was waiting for it. Instead, what came out was, "The pregnancy was real, you know."

Dara smiled slightly. "Oh, I figured it would only be so long anyway. I believed it."

She was one of the rare people who had believed it. "Why?" I asked.

"Cato never could keep it in his pants," Dara said plainly.

Much to my surprise, I started laughing. Mostly because she was telling the complete truth. From the moment I had met Cato, he had always had a hard time controlling himself. Around me, I supposed. It was comical that everyone had been able to pick up on it. Even Dara began laughing after a few seconds. The sight must have been strange. We had always hated each other. We still didn't really like each other. I guessed that we had just been put into the same situation. It had forced us to learn to respect each other's point of view.

It had taken all of this for me to realize just how hurt she was. Losing the person she loved most to someone she felt was the villain of the story. These days I knew how she felt. I knew what it felt like to lose someone. I loved Cato and I had been forced to watch Snow steal and twist him away from me. I finally knew how Dara felt. I could finally respect just how upset she was to lose her sister. I hadn't believed that she could have really loved her sister and that wasn't fair of me to assume that. Perhaps we were on the way to respecting each other.

She had mentioned the pregnancy and I had told her that it was real. She must have known that I wasn't really pregnant. It had been almost three months since the arena. I would have had at least the slightest bump on my stomach. But right now I had lost weight from all of the stress of the war. I was back to being skin and bones as I had been before the first Games and during the Victory Tour. Dara had long since calmed down and she was now staring at me expectantly. It was time for me to admit the truth to her. She had given me that much.

"The blast… it -"

"I know," Dara interrupted me. She might not have loved me, but no one wanted to let someone remember a traumatic event like that. "They told us. You don't have to tell me. You're young. It can happen."

If we were in bed together, he would strangle me. "Maybe once he doesn't hate me," I muttered.

We were so far away from those two young people who had discussed having a family. We couldn't even be in a room together right now. "Listen to me, Mockingjay. You don't take that much love from two people and eradicate it overnight. It doesn't work like that. It's still in there somewhere. You just have to find it. Look around," Dara warned.

"Thank you," I whispered.

Maybe it was in there somewhere. But it was going to take a lot of work and likely a lot more heartbreak to find it. "Don't thank me," Dara said, rolling her eyes, looking very much like Clove. "I just want this damn war to be over with. I'm sick of the Hunger Games and how the Capitol glorifies them. I just wish I’d gotten the point sooner."

"You get it now," I told her.

It was something I had told Cato when the first Games had ended. He had told me that he'd finally realized that it wasn't all worth it. The only thing worth it had been me. He had finally understood it. Now it was Dara's turn. I was glad that she'd realized the truth of the Hunger Games. I was just sorry that it had taken losing her sister and her home to realize it. I thought about hugging her but I knew that we weren't to that point yet. I just had to be grateful that she respected me enough to tell me what I needed to hear. To not give up on Cato.

Sniffling slightly, I pressed my palm into my forehead. "Pull yourself together, Mockingjay," Dara said fiercely. I jumped slightly. "We’re all fighting this war and we need everyone to win it. Even you. Especially you."

As much as I hated to admit it, Dara was right. I nodded at her thoughtfully, not actually bothering to look her in the eyes. It was time for me to pull it together. I did have a lot more mental clarity being here in Two and out of Thirteen. It was better. Out here I could manage my emotions and focus on the war. It was time to end Snow's reign of terror. Once everything was at least on the path to getting fixed in the world I could turn my focus back to Cato. Eventually, I would turn my focus back to him but there were so many other things to deal with right now.

Risking a look over at Dara, I noticed that she was staring firmly at the Nut. What did she think about all of this? "I'm sorry, Dara," I finally said. She looked up at me curiously. "About everything."

"Don't be sorry. We all have shit we're sorry for. We could drown each other with it. Don't keep saying it," Dara said.

"Right," I said, unable to think of anything better.

Dara looked at me for a long time. "District Two stands with the Mockingjay. You should know that," she said. The corners of my lips threatened to turn up in a smile. She wasn't everyone in Two, but her voice must have meant something. "I loved Clove more than anything, even though we might have fought all the time."

"She didn't deserve what she got," I admitted.

No part of me had liked Clove but I had never wanted her dead. I hadn't wanted any of us to die. "No. She didn't. Then again, we rarely do," Dara pointed out.

"Are you okay with this?" I asked curiously, pointing to the Nut.

Dara's eyes hardened. "Are you?"

Was I okay with this? I didn't speak again for a long time because I wasn't okay with it and Dara knew that. She knew that this wasn't what I had wanted. I'd wanted to give them a chance. I couldn't condemn someone to this kind of death. It was disgusting and I couldn't believe that it was Gale who had come up with this plan. No, I wasn't okay with this in the slightest. Far from it. But I also didn't know what I could do to stop it. They only listened to me when I was making some kind of speech and I wasn't exactly good with those.

For a long time, Dara sat with me, not saying anything. But I didn't need her to say anything. I actually preferred the silence More than once I would look over at her to try and find the similarities between herself and her sister. They were easy to see. The same deep brown eyes. The same dark hair. The same small stature. The same half-quirked smile. The same freckles. Every now and again I was half-expecting Dara to launch on top of me and hold a knife to my face, threatening to fillet me. How much easier things would have been if she had just done that...

While I was examining her, I had a feeling that she was doing the same to me. At one point in the afternoon, I saw Dara lean over and open a locket she had been wearing. Inside was a picture that I just barely got the chance to glimpse. But I did see it. It was a picture of Clove and her, laughing together on what I assumed was the training floor in the Academy. They looked the same as they had when I had first met them. How soon had that been before the Games? Did they realize then just what would happen because of a little girl from Twelve?

Sometimes I wondered that. What the other Tributes were doing just days before that Reaping that had sent them into the Games. Those people who had affected my life in their own ways hadn't had the slightest clue and I existed and vice versa. So blissfully ignorant. We hadn't even been thinking of each other. I wished that I could go back to those days and warn everyone to enjoy them. Each and every moment. Because those were some of the last moments of peace that any of us would ever get. Dara snapped the locket closed when she realized I was looking at it.

Day turned to night with no word from anyone on what had happened in regards to the Nut. No one ever came searching for Dara or myself. I assumed that they were too busy arguing among themselves on what was right versus what was necessary. I tried to see both sides of the argument but all I could see were bones. The bones of those in Twelve. The bones of those who had died in the mines the day of Mr. Everdeen's death. Even though the air in Two was muggy, I felt a thin layer of goosebumps form over my arms.

It must have been approaching midnight when an armed soldier approached us. He ignored Dara and instead stopped in front of me. "We need you," the man told me.

It had happened then. One way or another, the decision on the fate of the Nut had been made. The soldier gave me no indication of what had happened. He was stone-faced. Not that I was surprised. They rarely had any emotion on their faces. The man was alone. Katniss and Gale were nowhere to be found. Probably busy yelling at each other for either not supporting the other's choice, for being cruel, or not having a backbone. I was glad to not be there for that one. I got to my feet for the first time in hours and turned back to the Justice Building.

Before I could walk away Dara's strong grip locked around my wrist. "Hang on," she said, pulling me back. "Good luck with everything, Mockingjay. We'll be watching."

"Thanks," I said quietly.

She slowly relaxed her grip on my arm. "And... don't give up on Cato," she said, looking a little embarrassed to say it. "Believe it or not, Clove wouldn't have wanted you to."

Somehow I doubted that. I would think that she'd sooner like a see them drop a bomb on me. But I appreciated her words. So I said, "Good luck out here."

We didn't say anything else. We might not have particularly liked each other but it seemed that we were finally able to respect each other and what we had been through. I gave Dara a slight nod as she gathered up her rifle and turned back toward the Town Square and her own troops. I watched her leave before turning back to the soldier, hoping that Dara would live through the rebellion. Someone in that family deserved to carry on Clove's memory. It didn't occur to me until after we had departed each other's company that I hadn't seen her parents.

As it turned out, the meeting over the potential bombing of the Nut was a long one. But the call did happen, the decision was made, and within an hour of me leaving Dara, I was suited up in my Mockingjay outfit, with my bow slung over my shoulder and an earpiece that connected me to Haymitch in Thirteen - just in case a good opportunity for a propo arose. They had at least forgone makeup, aware of the lack of time we had. We waited on the roof of the Justice Building with a clear view of our target. Down below I could see the hovercrafts preparing to launch.

My stance was rigid as I leaned back against the stone walls to watch the hovercrafts launch. Everyone had long since left the meeting room we had all been in earlier today. I tried to look and see if I recognized anyone on the roof, but they all looked the same. The earpiece was silent. No warnings from Haymitch yet. He had been noticeably quiet since I had come to Two anyway. Likely trying not to make things any harder for me. Stories below me I could hear the engines winding up on the hovercrafts. My earpiece crackled slightly as it picked up their interference.

"Red Flag, this is Blue Leader. Form up on Charlie Tango, fifteen-hundred meters out. Weapons system, check. Commencing an attack formation," the leader of the first hovercraft said.

"Roger that," another man called.

"All bombers are outbound," the leader said.

Three hovercrafts raised into a synchronized pattern in the air. I stared off and watched as they headed to the Nut. My heart sank into my stomach. There were hundreds of people in that place. Maybe thousands. Here we were, watching as we killed them. It was like standing in the arena all over again. I felt like a Career, watching the weaker players in the Games fall right into my trap. A shadow appeared at my side but I didn't look over to them. I already knew who it was and I wasn't quite in the mood to speak with them.

"What's the difference, Aspen?" Gale asked. I turned to him. "Crushing the enemy in a mine or blowing them out of the sky with one of Beetee's arrows. It's the same thing."

"We were under attack in District Eight," I snapped, turning back to the Nut. How didn't he see the difference? "And that hovercraft wasn't filled with civilians."

"Doesn't matter. Even if those civilians are just mopping floors, they're helping the enemy. And if they have to die, I can live with that. No one who supports the Capitol is innocent," Gale sneered angrily.

Even if they were just mopping floors... Did Gale really not understand the point of doing what you had to do to survive? I would have thought that after seeing what the Capitol had done to Cato, Gale would have finally truly understood the kind of people we were dealing with. The kind of people who would force you into someone else's bed or they would kill your family. The longer I looked at Gale, the more that I could picture him wearing that magnificent purple fur collar - specifically designed to identify a Head Gamemaker.

Where had my best friend gone? "With that kind of thinking, you can kill whoever you want. You can send kids off to the Hunger Games to keep the Districts in line," I told Gale.

He merely stared at me. Gale was willing to do anything and sacrifice anyone to win this war. That was what the Capitol was doing. He didn't understand that he was acting just like they were. Just like the loyalists, he thought that he was right. There was no difference. As I opened my mouth to say something to him, the first of the bombs dropped on the Nut. I looked up to see the lights dimming all around the mountain as rocks cascaded down the side, caving in the tunnels and trapping all those who would try and escape. I turned away and closed my eyes, heartbroken.

"It's war, Aspen. Sometimes killing isn't personal. Figured if anyone knew that, it was you," Gale said.

My eyes shot open as I turned to him. "I, of all people, know that it's always personal," I sneered.

Haymitch had once told me that my friends and family would never truly understand what it was like in the arena. The feelings I had and memories that haunted me. I supposed this was the first time I really understood what he meant. Gale would never understand that even those nameless Tributes - these nameless mine workers - had stories and lives. Things that we had just destroyed. Even if we didn't know each other, I knew that it was always personal. There were cheers echoing all around the rooftop as they celebrated the first wave of the bombing of the Nut.

"Don't worry, Aspen, there will be survivors," Gale said quietly.

The survivors weren't the point. The point was that we had done this in the first place. As Gale walked off, obviously sensing that I didn't want him near me right now, I tried to keep myself from throwing up. I couldn't believe what we had just done. We had killed the miners, just the way they had done to us in Twelve. How could we have done that? Condemn someone to die just the way Mr. Everdeen and Mr. Hawthorne had? How as Gale okay with doing something like this? I finally found Katniss hiding in a corner. The two of us sat together with clasped hands.

She must have been thinking of the day her father died. "Are you okay?" I asked her.

"No," she responded, looking quite green.

"Go inside," I told her.

At least she wouldn't have to see or hear it. "No... I need to see it," Katniss said determinedly.

It must have been something she needed. I didn't like it but I also knew that she wouldn't listen to me. So, the two of us sat together and didn't speak. We just watched. That first wave of our hovercrafts was initially ignored by the commanders in the Nut because in the past they had been little more trouble than flies buzzing around a honeypot. But after two rounds of bombings in the higher elevations of the mountain, the planes had their attention. By the time the Capitol's antiaircraft weapons began to fire, it was already too late.

The first wave of bombs were only designed to catch their attention. To make them think that it was just another small scale attack from the rebels in Two. Just as Gale had said, it would be enough to draw fighters up toward the top levels of the Nut to ensure that no damage had occurred and to rescue any injured. That was when the bigger bombs would be set off, likely killing anyone just below the surface of the mountain face and forcing the survivors to flee - running straight into our troops.

Gale's plan exceeded anyone's expectations. Beetee was right about being unable to control the avalanches once they had been set in motion. It was a near disaster once the Nut had sustained heavy enough damage. It was almost impossible to see the mountain through all of the dust and debris flying through the air. The mountainsides throughout Panem were naturally unstable, but weakened by the explosions, they seemed almost fluid. If no one had been inside, I would have said that the destruction was beautiful.

Whole sections of the Nut collapsed before our eyes, obliterating any sign that human beings had ever set foot on the place. It was like starting from scratch. We stood speechless on the roof of the Justice Building, tiny and insignificant, as waves of stone thundered down the mountain. Burying the entrances under tons of rock. Raising a cloud of dirt and debris that blackened the already dark sky. Turning the Nut into a tomb. My stomach lurched painfully as I clasped a hand over my mouth. We were too far away to hear them, but I knew screams were echoing through the night.

Against my own free will, I imagined the hell inside the mountain. Sirens wailing. Lights flickering into darkness. Stone dust choking the air. The shrieks of panicked, trapped beings stumbling madly for a way out, only to find the entrances, the launchpad, and the ventilation shafts themselves clogged with earth and rock trying to force its way in. Live wires flung free, fires breaking out, rubble making a familiar path a maze. People slamming, shoving, scrambling like ants as the hill pressed in, threatening to crush their fragile shells.

My head was spinning with the thought of what was happening inside of the mountain. I knew what it was like to be unable to find my way out of a disaster. The inability to form coherent thoughts from a concussion. The ringing of your ears followed by a deafening silence after blowing out an eardrum. The burning flesh - both the pain and smell overwhelming - after being hit by a fireball. Suddenly I was back in the arena, desperate to find a way out, desperate to save those people inside. They hadn't asked for this. They were dying because of us.

"Aspen?" Haymitch's voice was in my earpiece. I tried to answer back and found that both of my hands were clamped tightly over my mouth. Katniss was pressed against the ground. "Aspen!"

On the day her father (the only one I had ever known) died, the sirens went off during my school lunch. No one waited for dismissal or was expected to. The response to a mine accident was something outside the control of even the Capitol. Katniss and I hadn't been all that close yet but I had considered us friends. More than anything, she was still like a sister to me and I knew that she would have been panicking. Her father was in the mines. We both knew it. I sprinted straight from the lunchroom into the hallway, throwing both kids and adults out of the way.

Katniss was already in tears when I found her. I grabbed her around the wrist and pulled her away before she could speak. Being slightly larger, I was able to trample the crowd to push toward Prim. Together the two of us ran to Prim's class. I could still remember her, tiny at seven, very pale, but sitting straight up with her hands folded on her desk. Waiting for us to collect her as we had promised we would if the sirens ever sounded. Neither of us could ever understand how she had remained so calm in the utter chaos of the day. We had always admired her for it.

The moment she saw us, she sprang out of her seat, grabbed our coat sleeves, and we wove through the streams of people pouring out onto the streets to pool at the main entrance of the mine. I remember how hard my heart was beating as I stared at the entrance, people bloodied and coughing as they stumbled out into the streets. I remember praying that they hadn't just lost their father. Together the three of us pushed through the crowd looking for Ms. Everdeen. She was the only one - besides myself - who knew just how deep in the mines Mr. Everdeen had been that day.

They must have thought that I was old enough to know. I didn't dare tell Prim or Katniss when they asked me. I just told them that it would be okay. I had said it to so many people and it had never once been true. We found Ms. Everdeen clenching the rope that had been hastily strung to keep the crowd back. In retrospect, I guessed that I should have known there was a problem right then. Because why were we looking for her, when the reverse should have been true? My heart sank the moment we saw her. I knew it already but refused to believe it.

The elevators were screeching, burning up and down their cables as they vomited smoke-blackened miners into the light of day. With each group came cries of relief, relatives diving under the rope to lead off their husbands, wives, children, parents, and siblings. I could see it in their bodies. The tenseness growing firmer and firmer with each passing group. I supposed that somewhere in the crowd was Gale and his family looking for his father. But he, just like us, was waiting for a ghost. We stood in the freezing air as the afternoon turned overcast, a light snow dusted the earth.

All three of us were shaking desperately but refused to move. I tried to send Katniss and Prim back home but they both refused. So, I held them both under my arms and waited. I knew right then that I would have to act as their mother while she was indisposed. The elevators moved more slowly after an hour and disgorged fewer beings. I knelt on the ground and pressed my hands into the cinders, wanting so badly to pull Mr. Everdeen free. If there was a more helpless feeling than trying to reach someone you love who was trapped underground, I didn't know it.

Most of the night afterward was a blur. Katniss and Prim huddled against me. Trying to reassure Ms. Everdeen that he was still in the mine helping others. The wounded sporting missing limbs and horrific burns. The bodies of those not lucky enough to survive. The waiting through the ice-cold night. Blankets put around your shoulders by strangers. A mug of something hot that you didn't drink. And then finally, at dawn, the grieved expression on the face of the mine captain that could only mean one thing. A scream that I could never let out.

What did we just do?

"Aspen! Are you there?"

Katniss was still down on the ground. I could see the tears threatening to overflow from her eyes. My hand reached out for her when I remembered that she wasn't the one who was calling out for me. It was Haymitch. Haymitch was probably making plans to have me fitted for a head shackle at this very moment. In the background, I could hear Seneca telling him to calm down and speak to me calmly. He knew, just as well as I did, what I was thinking of right now. I dropped my hands and forced myself to act normally.

"Yes," I said.

"Get inside. Just in case the Capitol tries to retaliate with what's left of its air force," Haymitch instructed.

"Yes," I repeated.

Everyone on the roof, except for the soldiers manning the machine guns, began to make their way inside. I reached out for Katniss and grabbed her underneath the arms, pulling her up and dragging her with me. As we descended the stairs, I couldn't help brushing my fingers along the unblemished white marble walls. So cold and beautiful. Even in the Capitol, there was nothing to match the magnificence of this old building. But there was no give to the surface - only my flesh yielded, my warmth taken. Stone conquered people every time.

As I walked through the halls I tried to imagine what this place looked like two years ago. On the inside, probably relatively similar. Maybe fewer people in soldier outfits. More Peacekeepers. A happier air. I tried to imagine Cato and Clove wandering through the halls, led by Peacekeepers, their families waving a final goodbye. Looking to the Nut, thinking that they would never have to work there after they won the Games. My hand dropped from the wall. Just like the Nut, this place was a tomb. Dreams came here to die.

"Katniss?" I called as we walked.

"It was like dad all over again," she replied.

"I know."

"Will there be survivors?"

"Gale says so."

"What do you say?" Katniss asked.

"I say my opinion was only one. I was outvoted. There might be some survivors. But who did we leave behind?" I said.

Her face went stark white. I knew that I shouldn't have said it but it was the thought on my mind. Katniss swallowed harshly and walked forward with me. We didn't talk much as we were led away from most of the other soldiers. I didn't want to be near them anyway. They were celebrating the deaths of all those innocent people. We walked out of the main corridors and into a slight offshoot of the building. The holding room for the Tributes. It looked a bit like the one in Twelve. We were quickly pulled away from where someone could keep an eye on us.

We sat at the base of one of the gigantic pillars in the great entrance hall. Through the doors, I could see the white expanse of marble that leads to the steps on the square. I remembered how sick I was the day Cato and I accepted congratulations there for winning the Games. Worn down by the Victory Tour, failing in my attempt to calm the Districts, facing the memories of Clove and the other dead Tributes, particularly Coral's gruesome, slow death by mutts and the boy from Nine's brutal death at my own hands. I began shivering again.

Boggs crouched down beside us, his skin ashy in the shadows. "We didn't bomb the train tunnel, you know. Some of them will probably get out."

"And then we'll shoot them when they show their faces?" I asked.

"Only if we have to," he answered.

"We could send in trains ourselves. Help evacuate the wounded," I said.

"No. It was decided to leave the tunnel in their hands. That way they can use all the tracks to bring people out. Besides, it will give us time to get the rest of our soldiers to the square," Boggs explained.

"Getting ready to kill them?" Katniss asked.

"If need be," Boggs told her.

A few hours ago, the square was a no-man's-land, the front line of the fight between the rebels and the Peacekeepers. The place that I'd had my conversation with Dara hadn't really been safe, considering how close we were to the front lines of the fight. I'd had a feeling that soldiers were watching us from a distance. Boggs explained that when Coin gave approval for Gale's plan, the rebels launched a heated attack and drove the Capitol forces back several blocks so that we would control the train station in the event that the Nut fell.

Well, it had fallen. The reality had sunk in. Any survivors would escape to the square. It would be mere minutes until they would begin leaking out. They would likely want to escape the Nut as soon as possible for fear of another possible attack against the survivors. They would realize that they had a better chance of fighting rather than trying to wait it out. I could hear the gunfire starting again, as the Peacekeepers were no doubt trying to fight their way in to rescue their comrades. Our own soldiers were being brought in to counter that.

"You're cold. I'll see if I can find a blanket," Boggs said.

Comfort for someone who had done something like this? The last thing I wanted was to feel even slightly good about this. I wanted to feel the guilt. I opened my mouth to speak but Boggs was gone before I could protest. I didn't want a blanket, even if the marble continued to leech my body heat. All I wanted was to turn the clocks back and stop this. I wondered if Dara might have been on the front lines of the attack. During our talk, I had never thought to ask her what her position was with the rebels. If she held some power or if she was just a regular soldier.

"Aspen," Haymitch said in my ear.

"Still here," I answered.

"Interesting turn of events with Cato this afternoon. Thought you'd want to know," Haymitch said.

Interesting wasn't good. It wasn't better. But I knew that I had to listen to him. I knew that I owed Cato that much. Plus I had a good feeling that even if I didn't listen, Haymitch would use that as an excuse to fit me with the headgear he had been threatening for the past few weeks. Still... I didn't want to get my hopes up for nothing. After all, he didn't say that Cato had had some miraculous recovery, which I knew was a stupid thought to have anyway. I didn't want to hear it, but I didn't really have any choice but to listen.

"We showed him that clip of you singing 'The Hanging Tree.' It was never aired, so the Capitol couldn't use it when he was being hijacked. He says he recognized the song," Haymitch said.

For a moment, my heart skipped a beat. Cato was remembering something. He had actually remembered something that had to do with me and apparently he hadn't lost it. It sounded like he hadn't had a meltdown even with the connection to me. It wasn't the same as him remembering his love for me or anything of the sorts, but it sounded like it might have been a step in the right direction. Then I realized that it was just more Tracker Jacker serum confusion. The elation deflated in me like a balloon.

"He couldn't, Haymitch. He never heard me sing that song," I muttered.

"You so sure about that?" Haymitch asked.

That was when I realized that he was right. He might have actually remembered the song. He might have even remembered me singing it to him. That afternoon that we had spent on the roof together before the Quell... I had sung every song I knew at his request. The one good thing about the roof was that the wind was so loud up there and sections of the roof were cut off from the security cameras - like the spot we had laid in. There was no physical evidence of that day other than in our memories. It might have been the one memory he had of me that wasn't tampered with.

He had asked me about the story behind the song and I had told him. I had also mentioned that Mr. Everdeen used to sing it wherever we went. He was teaching me. He had taught Katniss not long after, once she was old enough to recite it. He used to sing it to me when we went to the bakery. Come to think of it, I could remember Peeta being there sometimes. He, like Katniss, must have been around six or seven. We all used to stop moving to see if the birds would stop singing. They always did. It must have been just before Ms. Everdeen banned the song.

"Did he remember me singing it to him?" I finally asked.

"Don't think so. No mention of you anyway," Haymitch said. I let out a breath. His other memories of me were too strong. He remembered the song, but not me singing it to him. "But it's the first connection to you that hasn't triggered some mental meltdown. It's something, at least, Aspen."

Katniss, who could hear Haymitch speaking to me, leaning over and grabbed my hand. "He might actually remember you singing it to him soon enough," she whispered.

"Yeah," I said because nothing else seemed suitable.

What was there to say when the only thing I wanted to do was cry? Cato still didn't remember me. Only my voice. The voice that was always surprisingly like Mr. Everdeen's, seeing as he had taught me. He seemed to be everywhere today. Dying in the mine. Singing his way into my memories and connecting me to Cato's muddled consciousness. Flickering in the look Boggs gave me as he protectively wrapped the blanket around my shoulders. Shadowing over Katniss's pained face. His advice would have been so wonderful right now. I missed him so badly it hurt.

It seemed that I was always missing someone. Mr. Everdeen was just the latest. Soon enough I was sure it would be right back to Cato. He didn't even remember me from that day up on the roof. I was hoping that it might be the one memory he would be able to retain. But that probably just added to his confusion. He was probably trying to forget that. The memory must not have been that wonderful to him. Not if the one thing he could pick out of that day was the song. Not if he couldn't remember our words or actions. At this point, I would have rather been watching the Nut collapse.

The gunfire was a welcome distraction. It sounded like it was really picking up outside. Katniss sat huddled under the blanket with me. A guard came by to offer her to join in but she immediately rebutted the offer. He looked firmly off-put by her answer but she wasn't going to do it. The man ran off without even looking at me. After a little while, Gale hurried by with a group of rebels, eagerly headed for the battle. I called out to him but it was like I wasn't even there. Katniss looked at him with disgust. I didn't petition to join the fighters, not that they would let me.

My life was far too precious. I had no stomach for it anyway, no heat in my blood. Not like I once would have. I wished that Cato was here - the old Cato - because he would be able to articulate why it was so wrong to be exchanging fire when people, any people, were trying to claw their way out of the mountain. He would know why this was bothering me when even I couldn't explain it. Or was my own history making me too sensitive? Weren't we at war? Wasn't this just another way to kill our enemies? Was Gale right? Had I snapped at him too quickly?

The earliest hours of the morning arrived quickly. It was so dark that huge, bright spotlights were turned on, illuminating the square. Every bulb must have been burning at full wattage inside the train station as well. Even from my position across the square, I could see clearly through the plate-glass front of the long, narrow building. It would be impossible to miss the arrival of a train or even a single person. I would be one of the first to see them. But hours passed and no one came. With each minute, it became harder to imagine that anyone survived the assault on the Nut.

All I could imagine was the hundreds upon hundreds of bodies that must have been trapped in the Nut. Was there a chance that no one could escape? Had we misjudged and accidentally cut off the train tunnels? No. Someone would have said something. If there were any survivors, they could come out. They knew that there was still one functional exit. There was just a good chance that they were too afraid to. Either that or perhaps they were gearing up to try and attack us. For once I found that I might have sided with Two.

It must have been nearly daylight when Cressida came to attach a special microphone to my costume. "What's this for?" I asked.

Haymitch's voice came on to explain. "I know you're not going to like this, but we need you to make a speech."

"A speech?" I repeated, immediately feeling queasy.

"I'll feed it to you, line by line. You'll just have to repeat what I say," Haymitch reassured me. "Look, there's no sign of life from that mountain. We've won, but the fighting's continuing. So we thought if you went out on the steps of the Justice Building and laid it out - told everybody that the Nut's defeated, that the Capitol's presence in District Two is finished - you might be able to get the rest of their forces to surrender."

It took all of my might not to tell Haymitch that the only reason there was no sign of life was because we had killed everyone inside the Nut. But I knew that wasn't the truth. We were fighting someone. Not just the Peacekeepers. There had to be some survivors from the Nut who were trying to kill us for what we did. I peered at the darkness beyond the square. I could just barely see into the train tunnel. Without anything coming through, it was impossible to tell what was rubble and what was human. Making a speech out here would be like talking to myself.

"I can't even see their forces," I pointed out.

"That's what the mike's for. You'll be broadcast, both your voice through their emergency audio system, and your image wherever people have access to a screen," Haymitch said.

There was also the whole issue that they hated me. Seeing me on their screens would likely make them even angrier. I decided not to say anything. I likely wouldn't be going anywhere near the people. No opportunity for anyone to try and kill me. I knew that there were a couple of huge screens here on the square. I saw them on the Victory Tour. They showed photos of Clove in her Tribute outfit. It might work, if I was good at this sort of thing. Which I wasn't. They tried to feed me lines in those early experiments with the propos, too, and it was a flop.

"You could save a lot of lives, Aspen," Haymitch said finally.

"All right. I'll give it a try," I told him.

The people of Two hated me but I supposed that this would be an interesting time to see if I could manage to sway them. I got to my feet and walked out slightly. Katniss raised her bow and nocked a regular arrow, aiming for anyone who might have been aiming for me. Soldiers were standing on every side of me. I looked to the right slightly to find Dara standing there, gun raised, watching me. We looked at each other for a moment before she gave me a reassuring nod. I let out a deep breath and took another step forward. If she could do this, so could I.

"Let's focus on what it is you gotta say," Haymitch said through my earpiece. "Now, Plutarch wrote a speech for you -"

"I'm not saying that," I interrupted.

If Plutarch had written it, I wanted nothing to do with it. I would rather wing it and sound like an idiot. "Okay. Didn't think so," Haymitch said slowly. I could hear paper rustling around. Likely him putting away Plutarch's speech. "Let's, uh... But just remember, you're talking to everybody. Not just the rebels, but the Capitol, the survivors in Two. We want them to lay down their arms. So you might wanna experiment with a little sensitivity, warmth."

Even from here I could tell that Haymitch was rolling his eyes. Cato had once told me that I was about as charming as a cactus. He was right about that. I wasn't like him. I didn't know how to make people love me with nothing more than my words. I tried to imagine the people dying in the Nut, trying to bring out some emotion in my voice, but all I could feel was a numb loss. Not exactly the emotions that you wanted when trying to give a rousing speech about justice and enduring pain. Going with Plutarch's words was probably the safer bet, but I couldn't do it.

If I couldn't stomach his words, I didn't want to know what Two thought of them. A few minutes later I realized how strange it was, standing outside at the top of the stairs, fully costumed, brightly lit, but with no visible audience to deliver my speech to. Maybe I could pretend like I was talking to myself. At least I might have been able to calm down slightly if I could think about it like that. Like this was just a rehearsal. Like I was doing a show for the moon.

"Let's make this quick. You're too exposed," Haymitch said urgently.

Anything to get me the hell back inside. My television crew, positioned out in the square with special cameras, indicated that they were ready. It was the first time I had seen them all assembled together in a while. I tried to focus on Pollux's smiling face. I told Haymitch to go ahead, then clicked on my mike and listened carefully to him dictate the first line of the speech. I would just listen and decide what I would and wouldn't say and hope I wasn't about to make an ass out of myself. A huge image of me lit up one of the screens over the square as I began.

"People of District Two, this is Aspen Antaeus speaking to you from the steps of your Justice Building, where -"

The pair of trains came screeching into the train station side by side. As the doors slide open, people tumbled out in a cloud of smoke they had brought from the Nut. My throat caught as the words died on the tip of my tongue. I could vaguely hear Haymitch hissing at me to keep going to let the rest of the nation hear me, but I couldn't focus. They were there. There were survivors. They were terrified... They must have had at least an inkling of what would await them at the square, because you could see them trying to act evasively.

They had survived. They were innocent. They were trying to run from my own people. All they wanted to do was get out of here safe and sound. But we were going to kill them for trying to flee. Most of them flattened on the floor, and a spray of bullets inside the station took out the lights. Screams and bangs echoed all over the square. They had come armed, as Gale predicted, but they had come wounded as well. The moans could be heard in the otherwise silent night air. Even from here I could smell the metallic tang of blood.

Someone killed the lights on the stairs, leaving me in the protection of shadow. Haymitch warned me to be quiet and not make a movement, indicating where I was. A flame bloomed inside the station - one of the trains must have actually been on fire - and a cloud of thick, black smoke billowed against the windows. Left with no choice, the people began to push out into the square, choking but defiantly waving their guns. My eyes darted around the rooftops that lined the square. Every one of them had been fortified with rebel-manned machine gun nests. Moonlight glinted off oiled barrels.

Explosions and fires. It sounded like the Games. This was what we had turned into. Our own versions of Gamemakers. This was wrong. All of this was so wrong. Arms were reaching for me to try and pull me back into the Justice Building but I remained rooted in my spot, watching as another train rounded the corner. I prayed that it would only contain survivors. I couldn't stand more people dead. I wasn't Gale. I couldn't watch the war turn on innocent civilians. All of us killing each other when we should have been focused on one man.

"Survivors! Inbound!" one of the soldiers yelled.

"Ready! Ready! Guns up!"

"On the ready!"

"Guns up!"

Boggs wrapped his hand around my arm, trying to drag me back. "We gotta get you back," Boggs warned me.

Feet behind me were Katniss and the rest of my team, watching the destruction. "Here they come!" a soldier yelled.

"Weapons tight! Weapons tight!" The train stopped and the doors opened. Wounded instantly poured out of the train, confused and disoriented, they staggered around the station. "Everybody, standby! Everybody out! On the ground!"

Boggs released my arm, raising his weapon and running forward. "Put your weapons down. Get on the ground! Put your weapons down now! Weapons down. You!" Boggs shouted at a man who continued to advance. "Put it down! Put it..."

"Put your weapons down!

"Drop it! Drop your weapon! You! Drop it. Drop the gun! Drop it!" Boggs shouted. At that moment, gunshots began echoing through the station. Everyone dropped in fear. "Hold your fire!"

Whether it was the rebels or loyalists firing, I would never know. A young man not much older than myself staggered out from the station, one hand pressed against a bloody cloth at his cheek, the other dragging a gun. My eyes locked onto him. When he tripped and fell to his face, I saw the scorch marks down the back of his shirt and the red flesh beneath. Suddenly, he was just another burn victim from a mine accident. My feet flew down the steps and I took off running for him. Everyone immediately broke into sprints after me. I could hear Haymitch calling me vile names in my earpiece.

"Stop!" I yelled at the rebels. "Hold your fire!" The words echoed around the square and beyond as the mike amplified my voice. "Stop!"

Holding my hand out in front of me, I continued into the station toward the young man. The others hung back a few feet, raising their weapons. "Hold your fire!" Boggs' voice shouted.

"Stop!" I shouted as the gunfire began to dim.

"Hold your fire!" Boggs yelled.

More gunshots echoed as I dropped down. "He needs help!" I screamed.

"Hold your fire!" Boggs yelled, following me.

The man had long since dropped to the ground and hadn't yet made a move to get up. I could only pray that he wasn't dead yet. I sprinted toward him and slid forward on my knees to reach him. I leaned down and wrapped an arm around his torso to help him up. I could feel him breathing quickly. He was fine, just exhausted. I was about to ask the man what I could do for him when he dragged himself up to his knees, wrapped a hand around my braid to steady me, and pushed the barrel of his gun underneath my chin.

"Drop it!" Boggs shouted.

My body locked up as I kneeled in front of the man. I instinctively wanted to back up a few steps, but his grip on my braid was too tight. I wasn't moving. All I could do was raise my bow over my head to show my intention was harmless. Now that he had both hands on his gun, I noticed the ragged hole in his cheek where something - falling stone maybe - punctured the flesh. He smelled of burning things, hair and meat and fuel. His body was bone thin pressed up against mine. His eyes were crazed with pain and fear. Not hatred, interestingly enough.

"Freeze," Haymitch's voice whispered in my ear.

What the hell else did he think I would be doing right now? I couldn't move more than a few inches either way and I didn't want the man to get trigger happy. But this was the wrong time to get mad at Haymitch. I was the one who ran for him. I followed his order, realizing that this was what all of District 2, all of Panem maybe, must be seeing at the moment. The Mockingjay at the mercy of a man with nothing to lose. We were both shaking slightly as the man steadied himself, keeping me held at his level. His garbled speech was barely comprehensible.

"Give me one reason I shouldn't shoot you."

"Drop the gun!" Boggs shouted.

Everyone was watching this. Prim and Ms. Everdeen would see this. All of Cato's family would see this. I was vaguely aware of Katniss and Gale with their weapons locked on the man. But my head was in the way of their shots. He knew that. At the moment, it didn't matter either way. The rest of the world receded. There was only me looking into the wretched eyes of the man from the Nut who asked for one reason. Surely I should have been able to come up with thousands.

But the words that made it to my lips were, "I can't."

Logically, the next thing that should happen is the man pulling the trigger. I even prepared myself for it. Waited for that brief flash of pain before it all ended. But he was perplexed, trying to make sense of my words. He merely stared at me, surprised that I wasn't begging for my life. I experienced my own confusion as I realized what I had said was entirely true, and the noble impulse that carried me across the square was replaced by despair. I had no reason for him to spare me. Everything could be done without me. My existence was making things worse. There was no reason to not kill me.

"I can't. I guess that's the problem, isn't it?" I lowered my bow. "We blew up your mine. You burned my District to the ground. We each have every reason to want to kill each other. So, if you want to kill me, do it. Make Snow happy. I'm tired of killing his slaves for him."

My voice was shaking with unadulterated hatred. Not for the man. As I had said, he had every right to want to kill me. It was all for my hatred of Snow and everything he had done to me and every other District citizen. I dropped my bow on the ground and gave it a nudge with my boot. It slid across the stone and came to rest a few feet from Dean's feet. He and the other Hadley's were watching me with intense stares. But my focus quickly turned back to the young man. I stared at him, waiting for the click of the trigger. Kill me. Do it, please.

"I'm not their slave," the man muttered.

"I am," I said, my voice holding no emotion. "That's why I killed Marvel... and he killed Rue... it's why I killed Coral... and she killed Peeta... it's why Cato killed Thresh... and Thresh killed Clove... and she tried to kill me. It just goes around and around, and who wins? Not us. Not the Districts. Always Snow. I am done being a piece in his Games."

Peeta. On the Cornucopia just before he had died in the first Hunger Games. It was the last thing he had told me. He'd told me to never be a piece in their Games. He understood it all before the rebellion had even been an idea throughout most of Panem. I had been their pawn for so long. No more. Knowing what I might have been tempting, I locked eyes with the man. I hoped that Cato was back in Thirteen, watching now, that he remembered our talks about not being a pawn in their Games as they had actually happened, and maybe would forgive me when I died.

"Keep talking. Tell them about watching the mountain go down," Haymitch insisted.

Interesting time for a propo, Haymitch... "When I saw that mountain fall tonight, I thought... they've done it again. Got me to kill you - the people in the Districts. But why did I do it? District Twelve and District Two... we have no fight except the one the Capitol gave us," I continued.

The young man blinked at me uncomprehendingly. He might not have understood what I meant, but I didn't care right now. We didn't have a fight between ourselves. The only person who deserved to die was Snow. He was the one who should have been in the mountain tonight. He was the one who should have died. Not any of them. They had to understand that we had to work together if we wanted to win this war. My legs gave way and I sank down onto my knees before him, my voice low and urgent.

"Why are you fighting with the rebels on the rooftops? With Lyme, who was your Victor? With people who were your neighbors, maybe even your family?" I asked him.

"I don't know," the man said.

His hands shook for a moment before his gun finally dropped from my throat. He released his hold on my hair and stumbled back from me. He was still down on his knees. I was shocked that he had let me do. I had honestly thought that he was going to kill me. For a moment I merely stared at him, refusing to believe that he was going to let me go. But he was. He wasn't going to shoot me. I stared at the man for a second longer before shifting my gaze to everyone else, rebels and loyalists alike who were watching. I rose to my feet and turned slowly in a circle, addressing the machine guns.

"And you up there?" I shouted, stepping forward a few inches. "I come from a mining town. Since when do miners condemn other miners to that kind of death, and then stand by to kill whoever manages to crawl from the rubble?"

"Who is the enemy?" Haymitch whispered.

"These people are not your enemy!" I indicated the wounded bodies on the square, pointing to the people who were being pushed into submission by the rebels. I whipped back around to the train station. "The rebels are not your enemy! We all have one enemy, and that's Snow! He corrupts everyone and everything. He turns the best of us against each other." My voice broke slightly. "Stop killing for him," I shouted, my voice low commanding. "This is our chance to put an end to their power, but we need every District person to do it!"

For once I sounded like the Mockingjay. It finally sounded like I was the leader of a rebellion. I stared into the faces of everyone who was looking back at me. Their faces ranged from surprise to honor to unreadable. The cameras were tight on me as I reached out my hands to the man, to the wounded, to the reluctant rebels across Panem. This wasn't just for me. This wasn't just for the people in District 2. This was for everyone in the county. Somewhere I hoped that Snow was hearing me too.

"Please! Join us!" I shouted.

My words hung in the air. No one made a move toward me. In the darkness, I could barely even their faces. I couldn't tell what they were thinking. I couldn't hear any voices. I couldn't tell if they were thinking about killing me or joining me. I looked to the screen, hoping to see them recording some wave of reconciliation going through the crowd. One last chance, Aspen. Say something.

"Tonight, turn your weapons to the Capitol. Turn your weapons to Snow," I growled.

Instead of a wave of reconciliation, I watched myself get shot on television.

Chapter 17: Chapter Seventeen

"Always."

In the twilight of morphling, Cato whispered the word and I went searching for him. My fingers pulled through all of the fabric that surrounded me, so desperate to find him. I could hear him. He was close. It was a gauzy, violet-tinted world, with no hard edges, and many places to hide. He could have been anywhere. I pushed through cloud banks, followed faint tracks, caught the scent of cinnamon and dill. The smell of a District 12 winter. Once I felt his hand on my cheek I tried to trap it, but it dissolved like mist through my fingers.

When I finally began to surface into the sterile hospital room in Thirteen, I remembered. Cato had promised to stay with me many times before the Quell when I had been so scared of him leaving me alone forever. He had told me numerous times that we would always be together. Cato had always been the one to say that we would be okay. We would find a way to be together. We would always be together. As it turned out, he was right. But we weren't together in the way that I needed. So close but so far away.

Then Gale's image flooded my subconscious. Finally, I remembered what he had said that day. I was under the influence of sleep syrup. My leg and hipbone had been injured after I'd climbed out on a branch over the electric fence and dropped back into Twelve. Gale had put me to bed and I had asked him to stay with me as I was drifting off. He had whispered something I couldn't quite catch. But some part of my brain had trapped his single word of reply and let it swim up through my dreams to taunt me now. The two of them, so similar, but so different.

"Always."

It didn't take long for me to drift back off into what I had assumed was the dream world. It was the world that had become so familiar to me. In fact, it was the world that I wished I was really living in. I realized that I wasn't in a hospital bed, but a normal bed. I was also unclothed. I awkwardly grabbed the sheet that was laying around my waist and pulled it toward my chest, covering myself up. Much to my surprise, Cato walked into the room and held out a cup of steaming coffee to me. He was grinning at my obvious discomfort.

"Good morning," Cato purred.

"You're here," I commented dumbly.

"Always," Cato said quietly. He walked over to the bed and held out the mug. "Coffee?"

"What?" I asked dumbly.

"Brought you some coffee. Do you want any?" Cato offered.

"No..." I said slowly, wrapping my hand around his large forearm. "No, I want you."

Cato's lips tilted up in a grin. "Do you now?"

"Come here."

His forearm muscles contracted slightly as he moved with me. I tugged him over toward me. Cato grinned down at me as he took another two steps toward me and collapsed down onto the bed next to me. He reached back and grabbed the sheet from me, winding himself underneath to lay with me. He was clad in only black boxers. I tilted over onto my side to lay one of my hands against his bare chest. Cato grinned again as he placed a hand over mine, pressing a small kiss against the tip of my fingers. I smiled bashfully up at him.

"I thought you were gone," I said quietly.

"Gone?" Cato repeated.

"Away from me," I admitted.

What would I ever do if it was the truth? If I had to live a life without Cato? I didn't even know what a life like that would be. I supposed that I actually did know. I knew that it would be worthless. I knew that I had more worth to myself than a man. I was strong, funny, and beautiful. I knew that. But that didn't mean that a life without someone I loved would be fulfilling. After all of those years thinking that I would never want kids - I would want to run into the wilderness and steam in my fury forever - I knew now that it wasn't the truth. This was what I wanted.

He was what I wanted. "You think I would ever leave you?" Cato asked.

"Would you?" I immediately rebutted.

This was a man that had never really been a lovable family man. But he had become that kind of person lately. "Listen to me," Cato said fiercely. He wrapped an arm around my waist and rolled me over slightly so that I was against himself. "I will never leave you. No matter what happens... this is yours." Cato intertwined our fingers and placed my hand - and his own - up against his steadily-beating heart. "Always."

"Yeah?" I whispered.

"Yeah," Cato confirmed.

In spite of everything, I knew that he was telling me the truth. I knew that he was always going to be there for me. With me. Because that was something that we had promised each other a long time ago. I leaned up slightly and pressed a small kiss against Cato's mouth. He grinned into the kiss as his hands wound around my waist and he rolled me completely underneath himself. I smiled as I finally allowed myself to completely melt into him. There was no doubt in my mind that he really was the love of my life. I never wanted to leave him. Not right now.

It was moments like these that I was perfectly happy being with him. Freezing this moment in time would mean everything to me. "I wish this night would never end," I said, finally breaking our kiss.

"It doesn't have to. We can lay in this bed for the rest of our lives. We don't have to move," Cato said, running his hands over my bare thighs. "It's just the two of us. Right here. Right now."

"We never have to leave," I repeated.

"Never. We can stay here forever," Cato confirmed.

"Together or in this bed?" I teased.

Cato grinned. "Both."

Both of those options were perfectly fine with me. I wanted to be with him forever plus being in this bed with him wasn't half-bad. I smiled and pressed another kiss against Cato's lips. His hands wrapped around my waist so firmly that I was sure bruises were already forming. But I didn't care. In fact, I loved it. I never wanted to let go of him. I wanted this to be the rest of our lives together. His hands began to unwind the sheet from my body. I thought about letting him do so but he seemed to remember himself. That was when he finally pulled away from me.

"Aspen?" Cato muttered.

"Yeah?" I asked quietly.

"What do you think about starting a family?" Cato spat out.

He must have been nervous. It was the fastest I had ever heard him speak. I had to hear it almost ten times in my head before I finally realized what he had been saying to me. He wanted to start a family with me... it wasn't just a dream anymore. It wasn't the thought of me having a family as young as my parents had. It had once been the worst fear of my entire life. Having a child that could potentially go into the Games. But the Games were over. We were safe. Maybe it was time for us to try our hand at having a real life. A real family.

"Really?" I asked softly, a smile forming over my life.

Cato nodded almost awkwardly. "Yeah. If you're okay with it, I would love that," Cato said. I merely continued staring at him. I was... I was almost positive that I was okay with it. I was terrified of the idea but ready. Only with him. "We both have families who started their own young. I'm used to having kids in my life. I miss having kids around. I think you'd make a great mother."

"You do?" I asked awkwardly.

The only kid I'd ever really had in my life was Prim. I loved her more than life itself. Was that grounds to make me a good mother? "I've seen you around kids before. You always look so happy," Cato said.

It was something he must have noticed about me. I had never really thought about it. "Well... I don't think I've ever really thought about it before. I mean, I helped raise Prim - and Katniss for a little while - and sometimes I took care of kids around the Seam. But I never really thought about them. I think I've been so paranoid about my parents. You know, what happened to them. I never got to have my parents around. I don't want to leave my kids without their parents," I said quietly.

Cato stared at me with knitted brows. "What makes you think that you wouldn't be around your kids?" he asked.

The simple fact that my parents had been taken from me because of the Games... The Games might not have been a thing anymore but that didn't change things. There would always be the paranoia that things might change. What if something happened? What if there was some reason that I was taken from my children? What if I was killed? I knew what it was like to be raised without parents. I knew how alone it made you feel. I knew what it was like. There was no way I could ever put someone else, an innocent child, through something like that.

"Paranoia. Thinking that I would be taken away from them," I admitted.

Cato nodded thoughtfully. "You know what I think?" he asked. I shook my head. "I think that we would be together in bed on a Sunday morning. You would have your overly-sweet coffee while you were wrapped up in my sweater." I laughed softly. It was incredibly true. I hated the bitterness of coffee and the chill in the air was one of my least favorite things about District 12. "I would just be watching you. Smiling. Then our kids would run into the bedroom. We would spend the day running around outside together. No worries in the world."

"No Games?" I asked quietly.

"No nothing. Just us. Our little family," Cato whispered.

That peace and quiet... No more of having to kill Snow's slaves. No more of having to fight a war that I had never asked for. No more. "That sounds like a nice time. A nice life," I replied.

"Is it a life you want?" Cato asked.

"It's the only life I could imagine. A life with you. Our life together. I think I chose that life a long time ago," I admitted.

From those first Games we had been in together, we had chosen each other. "I agree," Cato said firmly.

We were going to be together forever. I knew that. I had known that for a long time. Some way or another I knew that we were always destined to be together. I was just glad that it was finally coming to fruition. Cato's mouth slowly turned over into a small grin. I arched a brow, wondering what he was smiling at. He merely raised a hand and gently brushed the hair back off my forehead. I smiled as I laid my cheek down into his palm. He pulled himself underneath the blankets, pulled my body up against his, and threw the blankets back over us.

"God..." Cato whispered, running his fingers through my hair.

"What?" I asked worriedly.

"I don't even believe how much I love you sometimes," Cato chuckled.

A pink tinge ran through my cheeks. "That much, huh?"

Cato blew out a puff of air in a slight laugh. "It hit me hard and fast. I don't even know what happened or why it happened. But I know that I am in love with you. I'm yours. Mind, body, and soul. Now and forever," Cato said. My entire body warmed up slightly. He was mine as well. Every part of me was his. Whether or not I'd ever wanted to admit it, I had been his since the moment we'd met. "There's something about you, Aspen. I don't know what it is, but you have the power to draw people into you. Once they're in, trust me, there's no way to leave."

"Do you ever want to?" I asked curiously.

If he had ever wanted to leave me I would have never blamed him. I wasn't the easiest person to have to deal with. But Cato shook his head. "Never. This is the only life I'll ever want," Cato promised.

"Better than being just a Victor?" I asked, only half-teasingly.

Cato smiled. "It would have meant nothing without you."

A small grin popped up on my lips. "You're charming, you know that?" I told him.

"I hope that I'm a lot more than that," Cato chuckled.

My hands slowly traveled up the side of his torso. "You are. You're everything that I've ever wanted and so much more. You're everything I never asked for but somehow got anyway," I said, making us both laugh.

"That's a good thing?" Cato asked.

"It's a great thing," I said.

We both stared at each other as Cato pressed a small kiss against my mouth. I laid on his chest for a few moments before he spoke again. "Look at me," Cato said firmly but quietly.

"Why?" I asked, suddenly embarrassed for no particular reason.

"I want to remember you like this," Cato said.

"Like what?" I asked.

Half-asleep and somewhat unsure of what we were talking about? "Peaceful," Cato said. I smiled at him. This was about as peaceful as I'd felt in a long time. "This is the first time in a long time that you've looked completely happy. You look relaxed. Not to mention I do like getting to see you like..." His eyes trailed down my bare body as he trailed off. I laughed as Cato pulled the sheets down around my chest. I laughed again as I wrapped my hand around the sheet and yanked them back over my body. Cato laughed. "Humble, too."

"Stop it!" I giggled, whacking him on the chest.

We both laughed as Cato tightened his grip around my waist and rolled me underneath him again. He didn't give me a second to catch my breath before he leaned down and kissed me so deeply that I was sure I was going to fall through the bed. But I didn't dare pull away from him. Not for fear that I might not ever get him back. I was so absolutely in love with him. More than I had ever been with anyone else and more than I had ever thought I could be. We finally pulled away after a while for lack of breath and settled down into the bed. I immediately threw my legs over his.

"Stay with me," I whispered, digging my fingers into Cato's chest.

"Always," Cato whispered fiercely.

A sudden jolt went through me as I came back to. That brief feeling of relief immediately drained from my body as I realized that it was just a damned dream. Another one. I was furious with myself for continuing to dream of Cato. I couldn't have him. I knew that. But it didn't change things. I wanted those nights to be back. Why couldn't we just be back together? Why couldn't we have those nights together again? I just wanted to have those nights back. I wanted my husband back. Instead, I was now in the middle of a painful depression.

At least, that was how I felt before the real drug kicked in. Morphling dulled the extremes of all emotions, so instead of a stab of sorrow, I merely felt emptiness once it flooded into my body. It was a hollow of dead brush where flowers used to bloom. Unfortunately, there wasn't enough of the drug left in my veins for me to ignore the pain in the left side of my body. That was where the bullet hit. My hands fumbled over the thick bandages encasing my ribs and I wondered what I was still doing here. It must not have been that deep of a wound.

The longer that I fingered the wound - which was incredibly painful - I realized that it wasn't actually a full wound. It hadn't punctured the skin. There was no open wound. I was definitely surprised that I hadn't died from the bullet wound. I vaguely remembered the intense pain from when the first bullet had hit me. I'd started falling immediately when the first one had hit me but I'd apparently been shot twice. At least, that was what the nurses told me. The entire thing felt more like being rammed into by a rhinoceros than actually getting shot.

It wasn't him, the man kneeling before me on the square, the burned one from the Nut. He didn't pull the trigger. It was someone farther back in the crowd. Some part of me remembered seeing the man in the second row of the kneeling crowd rise to his feet ahead of me. It didn't feel like the shard of shrapnel that had hit me back in Eight. There was less a sense of penetration than the feeling that I had been struck with a sledgehammer. Everything after the moment of impact was confusion riddled with gunfire. I tried to sit up, but the only thing I managed was a moan.

Getting hit by the bullet was definitely one of the most painful things I could remember. That was saying something, considering how many painful things had happened to me before. The nurses mentioned a few things that had happened in Two after I'd been shot (they had mentioned everything had been caught on camera) but I didn't remember much of it. I did vaguely remember seeing everyone run forward after I was shot. I remembered the impact of me hitting the ground. That was the end of my memories from that day.

The white curtain that divided my bed from the next patient's whipped back and Johanna Mason stared down at me. My body would have tensed if I could have managed it. At first, I felt threatened, because she attacked me in the arena. I had to remind myself that she did it to save my life. It was part of the rebel plot. She was the one who had taken endless torture from the Capitol for me and the rebellion. But still, that didn't mean she didn't despise me. Or maybe not. Maybe her treatment of me was all an act for the Capitol?

Johanna's face spread into a vague smile. "Well, there she is. The Mockingjay. Oh, that speech you gave. Oh, man, feel," Johanna said, pulling my hand to run over her arms. "I mean, I still have goosebumps."

"I'm alive," I said rustily.

"No kidding, brainless."

Johanna walked the rest of the way over and plunked down on my bed, sending spikes of pain shooting across my chest. I knew immediately that she had been planning on it from the moment she'd whipped open the curtain. She had plopped down on the bed much harder than she needed to especially considering she couldn't have weighed more than ninety pounds now. When she grinned at my discomfort, I knew that weren't in for some warm reunion scene. It might have been the slightest bit of an act in the Capitol, but she definitely didn't like me.

"Still a little sore?" Johanna asked happily.

"Oh, just a tad," I said.

In reality, I would have loved to have even more morphling to keep from feeling the pain from the bullet wound. Johanna finally released my hand and tossed it back onto the bed. I tried to keep myself from grunting in pain again, knowing that it would only make her even happier. With an expert hand, she quickly detached the morphling drip from my arm and plugged it into a socket taped into the crook of her own. After everything she had been through, I was shocked that she was even up on her feet, if not off the morphling.

"They started cutting back my supply a few days ago. Afraid I'm going to turn into one of those freaks from Six. I've had to borrow from you when the coast was clear. You don't mind, do you?" Johanna asked.

Mind? How could I mind when she was almost tortured to death by Snow after the Quarter Quell? I had no right to mind, and she knew it. That also explained why I was still feeling so much pain from the shot. I hadn't had enough of the drug to keep me from feeling pain. I had just had enough to dull the pain of my emotions. But I would have never said anything to her. She had suffered more than almost anyone else just to keep me safe. She knew what she was risking in the Quell. Johanna sighed as the morphling entered her bloodstream.

"Maybe they were onto something in Six. Drug yourself out and paint flowers on your body. Not such a bad life. Seemed happier than the rest of us, anyway," Johanna said.

On that much, we could agree. The Morphlings had always seemed quite happy in their own lives. Even when they were dying they'd seemed happy. In the weeks since I left Thirteen for Two, she had gained some weight back. She was still far too underweight though. A soft down of hair had sprouted on her shaved head, helping to hide some of the scars. But there was a thin sheen of sweat on her face and the bruises under her eyes were prominent. Not to mention that if she was siphoning off my morphling, she was struggling.

"They've got this head doctor who comes around every day. Supposed to be helping me recover. Like some guy who's spent his life in this rabbit warren's going to fix me up," Johanna said, flicking the bag of morphling. "Complete idiot. At least twenty times a session he reminds me that I'm totally safe. Safe from the Capitol. Safe from Snow."

Despite everything, I managed a smile. It was a truly stupid thing to say, especially to a Victor. Being safe was a complete lie. From the moment we stepped into the arena, even if we somehow managed to pull our bodies out, we were never truly safe. It was as if such a state of being ever existed, anywhere, for anyone. We were never safe. Not the people in the Districts, not the Tributes who lost their lives in the Games, and especially not the Victors, who lost their freedom in the arena. Even now we weren't safe.

"How about you, Mockingjay? You feel totally safe?" Johanna asked.

"Oh, yeah. Right up until I got shot," I said.

"Please. That bullet never even touched you. Cinna saw to that. Of course, your costume was bulletproof," Joanna said.

Of course. I remembered being in the costume for the first time. It was so strong and tough. The material had been almost impossible to feel anything through. It hadn't occurred to me at the time that the costume was bulletproof. I thought of the layers of protective armor in my Mockingjay outfit. That was why I hadn't been able to feel an open wound underneath all of the bandages. The bullet hadn't ever touched me. But there was no doubt that the pain came from somewhere.

"Broken ribs?" I asked.

"Not even. Bruised pretty good. Bruised lung. The impact ruptured your spleen. They couldn't repair it." She gave a dismissive wave of her hand. "Don't worry, you don't need one. And if you did, they'd find you one, wouldn't they? I wouldn't worry about the lung. But I am surprised they haven't found you a new lung. I mean, I've got two. Do you want one of mine? After all, it's everybody's job to keep you alive."

"Is that why you hate me?" I asked.

"Partly. Jealousy is certainly involved," Johanna admitted. I was a little surprised that she had. But I was impressed. I didn't think I would have been able to say it if I was her. "I also think you're a little hard to swallow. With your tacky romantic drama and your defender-of-the-helpless act. Only it isn't an act, which makes you more unbearable. Please feel free to take any of this personally."

Her voice lit up into something almost amused. She was clearly trying to see just how far she could push me. It was almost fascinating listening to her. There was some twisted part of me that almost enjoyed it. This was definitely the first time that someone hadn't bothered to watch my feelings at all. Johanna was going to say whatever it was that she wanted to. Back in Two, even Dara seemed to be slightly nervous talking to me. I briefly wondered what had happened to Clove's sister. I hadn't heard anything about her. I stared at Johanna for a moment, realizing that I wished I was more like her.

"You should have been the Mockingjay. No one would've had to feed you lines," I told her.

"True. But no one likes me," Johanna pointed out.

"They trusted you, though. To get me out," I reminded her. "And they're afraid of you."

"Here, maybe. But in the Capitol, you're the only one they're scared of now," Johanna said curiously.

She was completely right. For some reason, I was the only person that scared the Capitol. I didn't know why. I was so useless. It was impossible for me to do anything without some direction. Perhaps it was just because I wasn't scared of losing anything to them. I had already lost so much. I was glad that Gale appeared in the doorway, saving me from having to say anything back to her. Because I didn't know what to say back to that. Johanna neatly unhooked herself and reattached me to the morphling drip.

"Your cousin's not afraid of me," she said confidentially. She scooted off my bed and crossed to the door, nudging Gale's leg with her hip as she passed him. "Are you, gorgeous?"

Gale stared after her in confusion. I had seen plenty of girls flirt with him over the years. But I had never seen someone as playful with him as Johanna was. It helped that we both knew she wasn't being serious. Much to my surprise, I could hear her laughter as she disappeared down the hall. She had been to hell and back and she still could find it in herself to laugh. I raised my eyebrows at Gale as he took my hand. He had been there when I was shot so I could imagine that he was thrilled to see me alive.

"Terrified," Gale mouthed. I laughed, but it turned into a wince. "Easy." He stroked my face as the pain ebbed away. "You've got to stop running straight into trouble."

"I know. But someone blew up a mountain," I answered.

Instead of pulling back, he leaned in closer, searching my face. "You think I'm heartless."

"I know you're not. But I won't tell you it's okay," I responded.

Now he drew back, almost impatiently. "Aspen, it's like I said the other day. What difference is there, really, between crushing our enemy in a mine or blowing them out of the sky with one of Beetee's arrows? The result is the same."

"Gale, you know this isn't the same thing. We were under attack in Eight, for one thing. The hospital was under attack," I said.

"Yes, and those hoverplanes came from District Two," Gale said.

"Military planes. Those were civilians in the Nut," I pointed out.

"But they help all the Peacekeepers from the Capitol. So, by taking them out, we prevented further attacks," Gale said.

That wasn't the point. If we kept fighting with each other like this it was destined to only be so long before we completely wiped out the remainder of our species. "But that kind of thinking... you could turn it into an argument for killing anyone at any time. You could justify sending kids into the Hunger Games to prevent the Districts from getting out of line. Don't you get it, Gale?" I asked.

"I don't buy that," he told me.

"I do," I replied. "It must be those trips to the arena."

"Fine. We know how to disagree. We always have. Maybe it's good," Gale said.

I'd thought it the morning of the first Reaping. We always had known to fight. It was something the three of us had always been good at. "How long have we honestly ever gone without an argument?" I asked him.

"No more than a day," Gale said.

"That sounds fair," I admitted. I glanced around and immediately noticed that one member of our trio was missing. "Where's Katniss?"

"She's over in your compartment with Prim. She's been visiting you every day since Two," Gale said.

"How long ago was it?" I asked.

"Couple of days," Gale said.

It had only been a few days? It felt like it had been ages since we had been in Two. I glanced around again and stared at Gale. He looked alert. More than he had in a long time. I was honestly surprised that he was back in Thirteen. He had been thriving with command in Two. But he must have wanted to make sure that I was okay. As I stared out towards the door I remembered that it hadn't just been the three of us who had gone to Two. Most of Cato's family had also been there. Had they stayed or come back to Two with me?

"Cato's family? Are they all back here?" I asked Gale.

"Everyone came back," Gale said. I let out a soft breath. I wasn't sure if I was happy or not that they had come back. "Alana and Carrie were terrified that you'd really been killed. We had to radio ahead to tell them that you were still alive. Looked a lot worse than it actually was."

At least they'd heard that I was okay and hadn't had to wait it out. "Where are they?" I asked curiously.

Gale shrugged. "They're all hanging around. Aidan is in school. Carrie is taking care of Marley. Dean, Skye, and Julie are probably in training. I'd guess that Alana and Damien are waiting for word on your condition." I nodded at him. I would have to see them soon. "They've spent a lot of time in here since Two."

It hadn't really occurred to me until now that Cato's family were likely terrified to see what had happened to me. Some of them had been right there to see me get shot. The rest of them had likely seen the video of what had happened. From what I could see that video had been spread all over Panem. They had been so good to me lately. The least I could do was try and reassure them that I was just fine - only a little sore. I was thinking about going back to take another nap when another thought occurred to me.

"What happened to the man who threatened me?" I asked.

Gale shrugged his shoulders. "Don't know."

"No one killed him, right?" I asked.

Gale's head snapped to meet mine. "You care?"

The man was scared. He was trying to defend himself. "Of course I care!" I barked at Gale. His face immediately knitted into a scowl. "He thought that we had just tried to kill them. Which we did. They were scared of us. In his mind, killing me would have stopped more of his people from getting killed."

Gale merely laughed. "I can't believe you're defending the man who held a gun to your head."

"Maybe because I understand desperation. Guess it's the Hunger Games in me," I snapped.

"Guess so," Gale replied.

How had this happened? We were getting along just fine until right now. I let out a soft breath and tried to force a smile on my face. "Come on, Gale. I lost my spleen. Can't you be nice to me today?" I asked.

Gale shook his head. "You don't even know what your spleen is for. Or where it is."

"I'll miss it anyway," I teased.

We both laughed. Especially because he was right. I didn't know where my spleen was and I had no idea what it was for. Johanna had just mentioned that I didn't need it. As Gale seated himself on the edge of my bed I laid back. We had always been able to snap back and forth at each other before eventually relaxing. We were both hot-headed. We always had been. We always got over it. It wasn't like with Cato, where we had eventually relaxed in front of each other and gotten to the point that we never really fought. At least, the way we used to be.

"Between you and me, we've got District Two now," Gale said.

"Really?" I asked hopefully. Gale nodded. For a moment a feeling of triumph flared up inside me. Then I thought about the people on the square. "Was there fighting after I was shot?"

"Not much. The workers from the Nut turned on the Capitol soldiers. The rebels just sat by and watched. Actually, the whole country just sat by and watched," Gale said.

"Well, that's what they do best," I said. "Did they kill the man who shot me?"

"I don't know, Aspen," Gale said.

Gale still looked confused by my question. He clearly didn't understand why I was so against any of those people from Two being killed. I was about to say something to him when the door opened. Seneca was standing in the doorway. He smiled when he saw that I was awake. "Glad to see you up and doing better," Seneca told me.

"Thanks," I said, giving him as earnest of a smile as I could manage. Then I turned to Gale. "Give us a few minutes, will you?"

Gale looked absolutely infuriated to hear that I wanted to talk to Seneca. But he nodded his consent. "Yeah. Sure. I'll check on you tonight," Gale promised.

"Thanks," I said quietly.

Gale turned and left the room without another word. I glanced around for a moment before determining that we were now alone in the hospital. Like usual, I assumed that I had been given a private room. When I first arrived they gave me the private room because when I shot up in the middle of the night I would start screaming bloody murder. Apparently, it scared people. Now I had a feeling that it was because they were afraid of what someone might do to me if they could slip into my room with me unresponsive.

As Seneca entered the room, I tried to force a smile on my face. It quickly turned into a grimace. "Just in case you were curious, even with a bulletproof suit over your torso, getting shot still hurts like hell," I said.

Seneca let out a small chuckle. "Yes, it looked quite painful. Are you alright?"

"Been better. Been worse," I answered.

Seneca crossed the room and took a seat on the edge of the bed, much gentler than Johanna had. He reached out and grabbed one of my hands, the other brushing the hair back off my forehead. "You did quite well in District Two," he told me. Right up until someone had shot me... "No one was expecting that speech to come out of you."

"Trust me, I wasn't either," I said honestly.

"It wasn't the fighting, Aspen. It wasn't the bombing of the Nut. Those things helped. But it wasn't any of that. At the end of the day, it was you. It's always been you," Seneca told me. Perhaps it had been me. But I would never be able to completely understand how I had managed to start this. "You're the one who has convinced so many people to stand up and do the right thing."

"Including you?" I asked.

"Including me," Seneca confirmed.

As I took a long look at him I realized that he was genuinely smiling. He was one of the only people who had looked happy through this entire thing. "You look happy, Seneca," I commented.

His grin didn't fade. "Perhaps I am finally happy," Seneca said. I almost laughed. This was an interesting time for someone to decide that they were happy. "Things were always so tense in the Capitol. There was always an air of unease there. Once I left and grew closer to you, I realized just how simple things could be. How easy they could be."

"It's interesting, isn't it?" I asked. Seneca arched a well-formed brow. "Just how far things have come between the two of us."

Seneca smiled. "This is how I always imagined us."

That didn't sound quite right. "I thought you always wanted us to fall in love," I said thoughtfully.

He had admitted that much to me before. He had always wanted us to be together. "Perhaps I did for a long time," Seneca admitted.

We would have definitely made an interesting couple. We were two very different people. Seneca enjoyed using his words and authority to intimidate people into following him. But I went straight for the most violent approach. I would either shoot or stab someone before thinking better of it. What would have happened? Would I have been forced to keep my midnight rendezvous with Seneca a secret from Cato for the rest of our lives? That was likely. At least with the downfall of the Capitol, I was able to get out of that potential life.

"But I realized just how much Cato meant to you," Seneca continued. I nodded my consent. "I realized that you deserved to be with someone who took your breath away. I knew that would never be me. But it was Cato. So, I dedicated myself to helping the two of you."

"But for me in particular," I reasoned.

Seneca smiled slightly. "Yes."

"Can I ask you something?"

"You likely will anyway," Seneca teased.

I smiled. "Do you still look at me like that?" I asked curiously.

The last thing I likely needed right now was to know about someone else's feelings for me. It was bad enough having to deal with Gale's feelings for me while also trying to figure out what was going on with Cato. Did I really need to worry about what Seneca thought about me? Probably not. But I genuinely was curious to know whether or not he still looked at me as he had during the first Games. I couldn't tell. All I knew was that he definitely did care for me. The question was how much he still cared.

Seneca stared at me for a moment before his face split into a tiny grin. "Let's not focus on that right now, Aspen. It doesn't matter what the two of us are. What matters is continuing to fight this war and get Cato back to his normal self," Seneca reasoned.

There was something strained about the smile he was wearing. Did he really mean what he had told me? That it didn't matter what the two of us were. It only mattered that we got Cato back to normal. I sat in my bed for a long time without saying anything. I was glad that Seneca didn't speak or look me in the eye. He let me think about it. I had a feeling that Seneca did still look at me in a romantic light. But I wasn't in the right state of mind to start thinking that way right now. I just had to be grateful that he told me not to think about it.

Gale might have wanted an answer but Seneca knew that I couldn't give one right now. I was very appreciative of that. "I don't think I ever bothered to check in on you and see how you were doing after you made the announcement during the rescue," I said suddenly.

"That's alright. I think you had some bigger things on your mind," Seneca said.

"That's a good way to avoid the question," I pointed out.

Seneca smiled. He wasn't going to get away without answering me. I needed to know how people were reacting to him now. "Things are okay, Aspen. Obviously, no one is quite thrilled to know what happened. Most people here don't trust me. Not that they trusted me much before. They've asked me not to wander around Thirteen unless I have somewhere to be. I believe I unnerve most of the people here. The moment that this is over and it's safe for me to leave the confines of Thirteen, I've been asked to relocate," Seneca explained.

He was one of many people who likely wouldn't remain here after the war was over. "Where will you go?" I asked.

"Who knows?" Seneca said, grinning. His answer seemed to indicate that he wouldn't be returning to the Capitol. "Once the war is over, I think we'll be free to go wherever we feel."

"Anywhere, in particular, you want to go?" I asked curiously.

Where would I even want to go if I survived to the end of the rebellion? "Somewhere new, I think. Somewhere that I never have to think about that man who ran the Hunger Games," Seneca told me.

"That sounds like a peaceful life," I said quietly.

"Sounds like the kind of life you deserve."

"Somehow I doubt that's the kind of life I'll ever get."

"Let's say that we agree to disagree on that one. You deserve to have a good life. You know that," Seneca said.

"No, Seneca. I'm not so sure that I know that," I answered.

"I do," he responded.

But it still didn't seem right. I wasn't sure that I genuinely believed that I deserved a peaceful life after everything I had done. Maybe I deserved to hate myself and live in misery. Seneca reached down and pressed two fingers underneath my chin to tilt my head back and force me to look at him. It felt like someone had poked a hole in my heart and let it deflate. I was trying so hard to get back to my old self. Trying to be happy until I died, but I couldn't bring myself to even attempt happiness. Because I wasn't. I wasn't sure that I would ever really be happy again.

There was a soft knock on the door and Seneca instantly dropped his hand from my chin to step back. We both glanced to the doorway and I let out a breath that I didn't know I was holding. I wasn't even sure why I was holding my breath. Maybe because I still wasn't completely comfortable with people seeing me with Seneca. I didn't like knowing what they must have been thinking. Seneca knitted his hands behind his back, attempting to look as innocent as possible. I assumed that it was because the Hadley's were the ones who had interrupted us.

"Is this a bad time?" Alana asked, leaning in the doorway.

"No. Come on in," I answered, slightly upset that it would mean Seneca leaving.

"I'll see you soon, I'm sure," Seneca said, knowing that he wasn't welcome anywhere the Hadley's were.

"Yeah. See you soon," I said. Seneca grinned before heading out and letting the door fall shut behind him as Cato's family entered the hospital room. "Hi."

"Hello, sweetheart," Alana said, brushing my hair back.

"That was a hell of a shot you took out there," Damien added, walking to the other side of the bed.

"Hurt like hell too," I said.

The family laughed, although Carrie and Alana looked slightly upset at me making light out of what could have been a serious situation. "You're lucky that suit is bulletproof," Dean pointed out. I nodded. I knew that I would have been dead without it. "We all knew it, too. But in the end, that didn't matter. Everyone panicked the second that we saw you collapse out there."

"I think it was more of a jerk reaction. The shot surprised me," I explained.

Alana nodded thoughtfully. "You did the right thing. If you had remained standing it would have given the man a chance to shoot you in the head," she reasoned.

It hadn't even occurred to me that I really had almost died. "She's right. You did the right thing, dropping to the ground," Dean explained.

Had I only stumbled back from the first shot I likely would have been killed by the second. "As I said, it was more of a jerk reaction, falling to the ground. It really did hurt. I think it was the pain and surprise that had me pass out so fast," I said. It definitely hadn't been blood loss. I was pretty sure I hadn't bled at all from the shot. "I really don't remember anything after the initial shot."

"There wasn't much that happened afterward. Everyone was so stunned by what you had said and what had just happened that no one really bothered fighting back," Damien told me.

"That's good to hear. We don't need to be fighting each other anymore," I muttered.

"That's the good news. We're working on the invasion of the Capitol now," Carrie said.

The closer we got to moving in on the Capitol the closer I got to get my chance to kill Snow. "How are you feeling?" Dean asked.

"Like I got shot," I answered numbly.

Much to my surprise, they all started laughing. Even I cracked the slightest bit of a smile. But Alana's grin quickly fell. "We're sorry. We shouldn't be laughing," she said, glaring at the rest of her family.

"Oh, it's okay," I said, waving her off. "I'm sure there were a number of people who got a good laugh out of me getting shot."

"We didn't," Aidan said.

I smiled at him. "Thanks, Aidan."

"That must have left one hell of a bruise," Skye commented.

Shaking my head with the slightest of smiles, I said, "Trust me, it did." I thought about letting it go but I just wanted to hear one thing from Skye. "I hear you got to talk to Cato."

Skye definitely looked embarrassed. "Yeah. We talked for a little while."

Or maybe she was guilty that she got to talk to Cato when his own family didn't. "How is he?" I asked, unsure if I wanted to know the answer.

The family exchanged looks, probably wondering how much they should tell me. "Still not himself. But he's looking better," Skye said, trying to sound hopeful for me. "Put on most of the weight he'd lost since being in the Capitol. The bruises and cuts are fading. They're trying as hard as they can to erase the physical scars from his ordeal."

"The mental scars?" I asked.

"They haven't given up on him yet," Skye said.

It was her own way of telling me that, mentally, he still hadn't recovered significantly. As I stared at her, I realized that I needed to tell her something. "Sorry to hear about your sister, by the way," I said quietly.

"That's alright. I hadn't really spoken to her in a long time," Skye said tonelessly.

"Still..." I mumbled.

It was the same way I felt about having lost my parents. I'd never known them. But deep down that hurt was still there and it always would be. "They'll probably have you up and moving around soon enough," Alana said, probably in an attempt to change the subject.

Already? It had only been a few days since we'd been in Two. "But I just lost my spleen," I commented.

"We're pretty sure that they want to keep you moving and keep your strength up. It could be a problem if you start losing muscle mass all over again," Damien explained.

"Makes sense, I suppose. It took me a long time to build up my strength to fire my bow again after everything," I mumbled.

"If you need some help, I can go out hunting with you again. I had fun the last time we went out," Dean said, trying to smile at me.

"I'll take you out again sometime," I promised.

Perhaps one more trip out in the woods before going to the Capitol to die. "I'll look forward to it," Dean said, grinning.

The family stood around my bed for a little while as I searched for something to say. "How was it being back in Two for a while?" I asked curiously.

After everything that had happened with Leah, I wasn't sure how they felt about their home District. "Strange. It was interesting to see how our home has changed over the weeks. It's sad out there. Bleak. It brings back some hard memories," Damien said. It was one of those rare times I saw a hint of emotion in his eyes as he remembered his late daughter. "But it's still home. I'm sure you understand the feeling."

"Yes, I do. Sorry I kind of avoided everyone in Two," I told them.

We had barely exchanged more than a few words while we'd all been in Two. My longest conversation had been in the house with Dean. "Trust me, sweetheart. We understand," Alana said, laying a hand on my shoulder.

"Thanks," I mumbled.

Carrie and Alana looked between themselves. They must have been thinking about whether or not to mention the pregnancy. Finally, Carrie decided to go for it. "If you ever need to talk -"

"No," I interrupted immediately. I barely talked about it with my best friend. There was no way I was talking about it with my in-laws. Carrie looked very guilty for having said anything. "I'm sorry, but... no. I don't want to talk about it."

"Of course. Of course. We understand," Carrie said, immediately backing off.

"But we are here to talk if you ever need to," Alana put in.

"Thanks," I whispered.

Damien must have noticed that I had been pushed a little too far over my comfort zone. "We should leave you be for a little while. We'll come and check on you soon enough," he offered.

"Okay. See you all soon," I said.

The silence was perfectly good with me right now. I wasn't really in the mood to have to deal with anyone any longer. I wanted to go back to sleep and act like this was all just a nightmare again. I said goodbye to the family one at a time, exchanging gentle hugs and kisses to keep from hurting me. But I realized, just before they left, that this might have really been one of the last times I would see them. Maybe that was why I was feeling more relieved these days. Because I knew that my life was about to end. So, I decided to say one last thing to Carrie, whom I had always liked.

"Carrie?" I called when she was halfway out the door.

Dean stepped back to allow her to walk back to me. "Yeah?" she asked.

"Can we talk for a second?" I asked awkwardly.

"Of course," Carrie said happily.

The others quickly left the room, knowing that I didn't want them to overhear this bit of the conversation. As they left I gave them relatively awkward smiles. Carrie perched herself on the edge of the bed once they had gone. "It's been a hard last few weeks," I told Carrie, who nodded at me. "Things got even harder when I realized that I'd had such a huge secret hidden from me."

She had a daughter. She must have been able to at least empathize with me. Not that this was an easy thing to understand. "That's a hard secret to have hidden from you. I know how much I love Marley," Carrie said. Her voice was very careful as if she was unsure of how to broach this subject. "Having a daughter was one of the best moments of my life. I think one day I'll be ready for more kids. They're incredible. They make us so much better. The thing is, you're so young. We both are. You have time to have kids and have a real life."

But I had never wanted kids before. This wasn't the life that I'd wanted. "But the one person I would have been okay with doing all of that with currently hates me," I told her.

Carrie looked like she was debating whether or not to tell me something. "I was there when Skye spoke to Cato," she finally said. I raised a brow curiously. Now that one I hadn't known. "I don't think it's an issue of him hating you. I think he's just confused. I think he still loves you so much. That love is confusing him. He's getting angry. But there has to be a way to tap into it and remind him of who you both are."

Was there a possibility that Cato didn't hate me anymore? I couldn't have been sure. The last time I'd seen him he wouldn't have taken a moment to break through the binds and crush my head. There was no way that they had managed to undo all of that hatred. They never could. Besides, it was too late. I was going to go to the Capitol and kill Snow and die for my trouble. That was the plan. But if there was a chance that he could have remembered who I was and loved me again... would I change my plan? Could I help try and bring him back from the brink?

"If you were in my spot, what would you do?" I asked Carrie curiously.

Carrie thought about that for a while. "If I was in your spot, I don't think I'd still be alive," she pointed out. I wasn't even completely sure that I was still alive. "I couldn't tell you. The only thing I can tell you is that I would be nowhere near strong enough to have survived what you did."

There was no one strong enough to have survived what I had. I hadn't even survived it. Not really. "I miss him," I told Carrie, swallowing a thick lump in my throat to allow myself the moment of weakness.

Carrie reached over and grabbed my hand. "He's a good guy. He's easy to miss."

"Yeah."

For a moment I searched for the ring on my finger but it wasn't there. I'd almost forgotten that it was no longer on me. It was tucked in my drawer. "He's your husband. You saw sides of him that no one else did," Carrie pointed out.

"Yeah."

He had only ever been weak for me... and I had loved it. "Did you ever want kids?" Carrie asked curiously, after a brief silence.

"No," I answered immediately. She smiled at me. "But if there was anyone I could have had them with, it was him."

"I always imagined that he would make a good father," she said thoughtfully.

"I agree. He used to, at least," I commented.

Right now he probably wasn't stable enough to have a child. He would kill them. "There's a good chance that he still will. Don't give up on him, Aspen. Please," Carrie half-begged.

It would have been cruel to say anything else. I knew that I had to tell her. So, I said, "I won't."

Carrie smiled gratefully. There were tears in her eyes. "Thank you."

Tears began to build in mine too. Mostly because I hated having to lie to a girl who had never been anything but nice and loving to me. I let out a massive breath as Carrie looked away to brush the tears from her eyes. I didn't want to have to give up on Cato. But there was that pathetic lingering fear in the back of my mind. I was terrified of him now. Terrified that he would kill me if I was in a room with him and terrified that he would break my heart by never wanting to be with me again. I couldn't open myself up like that. I wasn't any good at it. I never had been.

Thankfully there were other things to keep my mind occupied in the following days. I would have thought that losing a major organ would entitle me to lie around a few weeks, but for some reason, my doctors wanted me up and moving almost immediately. Even with the morphling, the internal pain was severe the first few days, but then it slacked off considerably. The soreness from the bruised ribs, however, promised to hang on for a while. I began to resent Johanna dipping into my morphling supply, but I still let her take whatever she liked.

We both knew that I would have had no ground to stand on from telling her not to take what she wanted. Rumors of my death had been running rampant (apparently Snow had made a number of broadcasts about the death of the Mockingjay), so they sent in the team to film me in my hospital bed. I showed off my stitches and impressive bruising and congratulated the Districts on their successful battle for unity. It must have sounded incredibly robotic. Then I warned the Capitol to expect us soon. That one had some real emotion in it.

When Snow saw that broadcast, I wanted him to know that I was promising him that he would see me soon. My face would be the last thing he would see before his death. As part of my rehabilitation, I took short walks above ground each day. Gale and Katniss helped me out with gaining back the strength to draw a bowstring. Dean took me on progressively longer walks to improve my stamina. Carrie would come out for some company and Aidan liked to go just to get some fresh air. Prim would come and talk to me about the hospital while Seneca told me about the rebellion's stance.

One afternoon, Plutarch joined me and gave me a full update on our current situation. Now that District 2 had allied with us, the rebels were taking a breather from the war to regroup. Fortifying supply lines, seeing to the wounded, and reorganizing their troops. The Capitol, like Thirteen during the Dark Days, found itself completely cut off from outside help as it held the threat of nuclear attack over its enemies. Unlike Thirteen, the Capitol was not in a position to reinvent itself and become self-sufficient.

"Oh, the city might be able to scrape along for a while. Certainly, there are emergency supplies stockpiled," Plutarch explained. I had a feeling that they wouldn't be able to last more than a few months.

"How long can they go?" I asked.

Plutarch glanced up thoughtfully. "A few months, if they're lucky. Likely not even that. But the significant difference between Thirteen and the Capitol are the expectations of the populace. Thirteen was used to hardship, whereas in the Capitol, all they've known is Panem et Circenses."

"What's that?" I asked. I recognized Panem, of course, but the rest was nonsense.

"It's a saying from thousands of years ago, written in a language called Latin about a place called Rome," Plutarch explained. I nodded. I vaguely remembered dozing off during a lesson about the old world after a long night-hunt with Gale. He'd whacked me over the back of the head to wake me up and avoid getting detention. "Panem et Circenses translates into 'Bread and Circuses.' The writer was saying that in return for full bellies and entertainment, his people had given up their political responsibilities and therefore their power."

I thought about the Capitol. The excess of food. And the ultimate entertainment. The Hunger Games. "So that's what the Districts are for. To provide the bread and circuses," I said.

"Yes. And as long as that kept rolling in, the Capitol could control its little empire. Right now, it can provide neither, at least at the standard the people are accustomed to," Plutarch said. That would be the ultimate problem. To see how little they could live on. "We have the food and I'm about to orchestrate an entertainment propo that's sure to be popular. After all, everybody loves a wedding."

I froze dead in my tracks, sick at the idea of what he was suggesting. Somehow staging some perverse wedding between Cato and me. There was also the whole problem that we'd already gotten married back in the Capitol. That had been when we were still in love. Not like this. I hadn't been able to face that one-way glass since I'd been back and, at my own request, only got updates about Cato's condition from Haymitch. He spoke very little about it. Different techniques were being tried. There would never truly be a way to cure him.

The only other request I'd gotten was from Cato's family a few days after I'd been shot. Even they had to admit that Cato wasn't really the same person he had been before. I loved Cato more than anything but he wasn't the same person anymore. He didn't love me anymore. He likely never would. And now they wanted me to marry Cato (again) for a propo? Absolutely not. That would be too tough on both of us. There was also the issue that it would have to be heavily edited since Cato would be trying to kill me the entire time.

"We've already done that," I growled angrily.

Plutarch rushed to reassure me. "Oh, no, Aspen. Not your wedding. We could never beat the one the Capitol threw for you."

"Doubt it," I muttered.

The wedding that had been thrown for us in the Capitol was something that someone from District 1 would have loved. Nothing from anyone else. It had also only been put on to disguise the beginning of the rebellion. I thought back on that wedding with disdain. They could have told us the truth. I could have worn something that hadn't been designed by Snow or picked by the same people who were cheering on my deaths. We could have recited vows that were completely genuine - not vows designed for a television show. Something for just the two of us. Not for all of them.

"We're talking about Finnick and Annie's," Plutarch said. I let out a deep breath. "All you need to do is show up and pretend to be happy for them."

"That's one of the few things I won't have to pretend, Plutarch," I told him.

The next few days brought about a flurry of activity as the event was planned. The differences between the Capitol and Thirteen were thrown into sharp relief by the event. When Coin said 'wedding,' she meant two people signing a piece of paper and being assigned a new compartment. Plutarch meant hundreds of people dressed in finery at a three-day celebration. It was amusing to watch them haggle over the details. It was some of the only relief from the constant depression I'd had in a long time. Plutarch had to fight for every guest, every musical note.

After Coin vetoed a dinner, entertainment, and alcohol, Plutarch yelled, "What's the point of the propo if no one's having any fun!"

I leaned over to Finnick, who was enjoying watching the planning of his own wedding. He had looked much happier since Annie had returned to him. "Even I have to admit that it's kind of fun to watch," I whispered.

"Even now - away from the Capitol - I don't get to choose what I want to do for my wedding," Finnick said.

"They're not asking you what you want?" I asked curiously.

"I assume they will once they figure out just how extravagant it will be," Finnick said. I gave him a slightly strained smile. "You know, we'll both understand if you can't bring yourself -"

"To come to the wedding?" I interrupted. Finnick nodded slowly. "I'm coming, Finnick. No matter what's happening to me, I'm really happy for the two of you. You both deserve it."

"Thank you," Finnick said, smiling at me. He laid a hand on my knee. "You'll be happy again one day. I promise."

"We'll see," I responded. I glanced up, wondering why Finnick was alone. "Where's Annie?"

"She likes to stay in the peace and quiet of the compartment as much as possible," Finnick explained.

It definitely wasn't something I could blame her for. "Go be with her," I told Finnick, gently nudging him from the chair. "I'll make sure they don't put her in some dress like mine."

Finnick grinned as he leaned over and pressed a kiss against my forehead. "Take care," he whispered, immediately shooting from his chair to be with Annie.

It became quite hard to put a Gamemaker on a budget. Not that it should have been a surprise. The Games were the most expensive event in Panem - save my wedding to Cato. But even this quiet celebration caused a stir in Thirteen, where they seemed to have no holidays at all. When it was announced that children were wanted to sing District 4's wedding song, practically every kid showed up. They wanted me to help but I was quick to turn them down. No one argued. There was no shortage of volunteers to help make decorations. In the dining hall, people chatted excitedly about the event.

Maybe it was more than the festivities. Maybe it was that we were all so starved for something good to happen that we wanted to be part of it. It would explain why - when Plutarch had a fit over what the bride would wear - I found myself volunteering to take Annie back to my house in Twelve, where Cinna left a variety of evening clothes in a big storage closet downstairs. All of the wedding gowns he designed for me went back to the Capitol once the photo shoot had ended, but there were some dresses I wore on the Victory Tour.

Despite having met Annie before, I was a little leery about being alone with her since all I really knew about her was that Finnick loved her and everybody thought she was mad. But I didn't mind. A few hours spent with her wouldn't be too terrible. Maybe we would finally be able to really talk to each other. We had only exchanged a few smiles in the hallway and she had given me a brief 'congratulations' at my wedding. In fact, that was the last time we had spoken. It was hard to see her again up-close after so much had changed.

On the hovercraft ride to Twelve, I officially decided that she was less mad than unstable. She laughed at odd places in the conversation or dropped out of it distractedly. Those green eyes fixated on a point with such intensity that you found yourself trying to make out what she saw in the empty air. Sometimes, for no reason, she pressed both her hands over her ears as if to block out a painful sound. Much the way I did in the Jabberjay section of the arena. I supposed that I understood her issues. All right, she was definitely strange, but if Finnick loved her, that was good enough for me.

During the ride to Twelve, I found myself following her lead in the conversation. After all, I wasn't really sure what she was okay talking about and what she wasn't. We completely avoided any topic of the Capitol or Cato. Both of which I was glad for. Instead, we mostly focused on Finnick and their relationship. Apparently, almost a full year had passed before the two of them had become romantically entangled with each other. Annie commented that they had grown closer after returning to District 4 where he had helped her recover. The thought made me smile.

"Recovery is always possible," Annie said, looking me dead in the eyes.

For just a moment I saw that young woman who I had seen going into the Seventieth Hunger Games - afraid but strong. Just as I had once been. I smiled at her, cleared my throat, and said, "Anything in particular you want?"

"Something green or blue," Annie said absently.

"No, I like blue. It reminds me of the sky. I used to be stuck inside training all day when I would really want to practice in the yard. You knew that. You had to be at least sixteen to practice in the yard. But, anyways, everything of mine was blue. My walls and my clothes. My family hates blue, to say the least."

"Yeah. I love blue..." I muttered thickly.

One of the only good things about the day was the simple fact that I had gotten permission for my Prep Team to come along, so I was relieved of having to make any fashion decisions. Which was good, since Effie had once commented that I couldn't even match a simple pair of pants and a plain shirt. When I opened the closet, we all fell silent because Cinna's presence was so strong in the flow of the fabrics. Then Octavia dropped to her knees, rubbed the hem of a skirt against her cheek, and burst into tears.

"It's been so long since I've seen anything pretty," Octavia gasped.

My hand lingered on the dress that I had worn in Two for a long time. Cinna had made it with me in mind. He had died with me in mind. Annie was incredibly respectful as she tried on my dresses. She only commented when absolutely necessary and it was only to say 'yes' or 'no' to them. Some of the dresses I could barely remember wearing. Annie openly refused to wear any of the designs from after when Cato had proposed to me or any of the designs that actually looked like a wedding dress. As she said, it was out of respect for that relationship.

Much to my surprise, Annie gently opened one of the side closets that I honestly couldn't ever remember even opening. I wished that she hadn't. Right inside was the bare bones of the dress that I had worn for my wedding. It was the dress I'd tried on for the photo shoot. I walked toward the closet and laid a hand on the fabric gently. Annie very carefully pulled my arm off of the material and closed the door, seeing how close to tears I was. She instead turned away and went through the dresses from the Victory Tour alone.

It took her just over an hour to settle on some clothes and jewelry from my own collection before we returned to Thirteen. I desperately avoided people for the next few days as the preparations for the wedding were thrown into full swing. A few times I did wander out with Carrie and Marley, both of whom clearly enjoyed watching the planning. When the day of the wedding came, I headed down with Prim, Katniss, and Ms. Everdeen. It was the happiest I had seen Prim look in a long time. Her smile brought a genuine smile to my face for the first time in weeks.

Despite reservations on Coin's side that it was too extravagant, and on Plutarch's side that it was too drab, the wedding was a smash hit. The three hundred lucky guests culled from Thirteen and the many refugees wore their everyday clothes, the decorations were made from autumn foliage, and the music was provided by a choir of children accompanied by the lone fiddler who made it out of Twelve with his instrument. I sat in between my own family and Cato's during the ceremony. Gale had been just behind us. I'd felt his hand rest on my shoulder reassuringly during the vows.

So the entire thing was simple, frugal by the Capitol's standards. It didn't matter because nothing could compete with the beauty of the couple. It wasn't about their borrowed finery - Annie decided to wear a green silk dress I wore in Five, Finnick one of Cato's suits that they altered - although the clothes were striking. Who could look past the radiant faces of two people for whom this day was once a virtual impossibility? A jolt went through my stomach at seeing the two of them so happy in the clothes that Cato and myself had been so miserable in when we'd worn them.

No matter what, the two of them were always so happy with each other while there had always been some disaster in my life with Cato. Dalton, the cattle guy from Ten, conducted the ceremony since it was similar to the one used in his District. He was much more somber than Caesar Flickerman had been at mine but it suited the couple wonderfully. There were unique touches of District 4. A net woven from long grass that covers the couple during their vows, the touching of each other's lips with salt water, and the ancient wedding song, which likened marriage to a sea voyage.

No, I didn't have to pretend to be happy for them. In reality, I was happier than I had been in a long time. A small smile fell over my face as I watched the two of them exchange their vows. There was a glow on Annie's face and clarity in her eyes that I had never seen before. She was completely aware of what was happening right now. Perhaps for the first time since she had won her Hunger Games years ago. And Finnick... for the first time, I saw real love in his eyes. The sparkle felt warm.

"From this day forth, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, I promise to love and cherish you each day," Annie said quietly, her gentle voice echoing off the metal walls.

"I, Finnick Odair, take you, Annie Cresta, as my wife from this day forth. Together or apart, we will always be united. One life, one purpose, one destiny," Finnick recited.

"You may kiss the bride," Dalton said, giving the first honest smile I'd ever seen.

After the kiss that sealed the union, the cheers, and a toast with apple cider, the fiddler struck up a tune that turned every head from Twelve. Even mine. We might have been the smallest, poorest district in Panem, but we knew how to dance. Nothing had been officially scheduled at that point, but Plutarch, who was calling the propo from the control room, must have had his fingers crossed. Sure enough, Greasy Sae grabbed Gale by the hand and pulled him into the center of the floor and faced off with him. People poured in to join them, forming two long lines. And the dancing began.

The look on Gale's face made me smile. It was the first time that I'd seen him happy in a long time. That smile that I had once only seen for me was now almost foreign. I supposed that I didn't deserve it. Finnick and Annie looked so happy as they moved into the center of the floor, immediately surrounded by all of the others from Thirteen. The survivors from Twelve were some of the first to begin teaching the steps that went along with the fiddler's song. I had once danced to the song so long that I'd almost completely torn through the skin on the bottom of my feet.

Tonight I was more than content to just watch. Effie looked about as happy as I had seen her since arriving in Thirteen. She was grinning brightly, clapping along as hard as she could. I was sure that she would demand the wedding never end. She would then have to take off the makeup and hair that she was wearing. Apparently, my Prep Team had picked up some of her things that had been stashed away at my house in District 12. I was standing off to the side, clapping along to the rhythm, when a bony hand pinched me above the elbow.

I whipped around in annoyance. That hurt... "What?" I snapped.

Johanna scowled at me. "Are you going to miss the chance to let Snow see you dancing?"

She was right and she knew it. What could spell victory louder than a happy Mockingjay twirling around to music? I found Prim and Katniss in the crowd at the center ring of the dancers. Ms. Everdeen - who had been serving as the third partner - stepped out and off to the side to allow me to take over the dance. Since winter evenings had given us a lot of time to practice, we were actually all pretty good partners. I brushed off their concerns about my ribs, and we took our places in the line. I noticed that a lot of people backed off to allow us some room.

The dance came back to me naturally. I noticed that even the bride and groom backed off to allow me some room to dance. Katniss used to joke that if I had liked being the center of attention a little bit more I would have been the best dancer in Twelve. The way that I bounced along to the music and took up the entire floor. The cameras must have all been on me as I twirled from partner to partner. Gale to Katniss to Prim to Ms. Everdeen to Greasy Sae and back again. It hurt, but the satisfaction of having Snow watch me dance with my little sister and friends reduced other feelings to dust.

Dancing transformed us. We taught the steps to the District 13 guests. The dance was complicated and they clearly weren't even a fraction as graceful with it as we were but that wasn't the point. What mattered was that everyone was having fun for the first time in months. Years. The first time in our lives. We insisted on a special number for the bride and groom. Joined hands and made a giant, spinning circle where people showed off their footwork. I even attempted a cartwheel with Prim that ended in us piling together on the floor. Nothing silly, joyful, or fun had happened in so long.

Eventually, I realized that there were still a large group of people who hadn't joined in on the dancing. Maybe it was because they didn't know the steps or maybe it was because they were afraid to give it a try. Either way, I didn't care. If my death was coming soon the least I could do was give my in-law's a happy memory with me. The Hadley's were all standing off to the side - as I had been earlier - watching everyone. They smiled brightly as their eyes followed me around the dance floor. This must have been the first time they had genuinely seen me this light.

Carried by the feeling of weightlessness, I bounced over to them. "Come on," I gasped, holding out my hand, exhausted from all of the dancing and the pain of the bullet wound. "All of you."

They exchanged nervous looks. "People in District 2 rarely dance," Damien pointed out.

I smiled. "Tonight you do."

Dean was the first to laugh and step forward. "What can it hurt?" he asked his family, taking my hand. "Let's go."

Dean whipped me around in a little twirl as we dashed back into the center of the ring of dancers. The rest of the family followed closely behind. Carrie held Marley in her arms as she bobbed the little girl up and down. Prim took Aidan and began teaching him the steps. Katniss and Ms. Everdeen showed Alana and Damien the steps to the traditional dance. Skye and Julie joined the ring with Dean and myself as I threw them about the floor. We ended up missing many of the steps and simply laughing together but I wouldn't have had it any other way.

None of my family from Two were good at the dance. In fact, they were genuinely terrible dancers. But that just made them all the more endearing to watch. I could tell that they were actually having a good time. Partially because they got a chance to have some fun themselves and partially because they finally got to see me as I had once been - happy and almost carefree. Aidan was definitely the best dancer in the family. He spent a lot of time with me. I found myself laughing and smiling for the first time in what felt like months. I had missed this feeling of weightlessness.

After a little while, I pulled away from them. My ribs were throbbing from exertion. "Hi," a voice called from behind me.

I turned back to see Annie and Finnick - arms wound tight around each other - standing just behind me. "Hey, Annie. Congratulations!" I chirped, jumping forward to hug both of them. "To both of you. I'm so happy for you."

"Thank you," Annie said quietly. "I wondered if I could ask you something?"

"Anything," I answered.

"Will you sing something?" Annie asked.

My entire body locked up. I hated singing in front of people but how could I have denied them? The newlyweds who had finally gotten their happiness. "For everyone?" I asked weakly.

"Yes. You have a lovely voice," Annie said.

Someone must have told her. She had never heard me sing. "Oh... I..." I muttered.

"You don't have to. We just thought it might be nice," Annie said.

There was absolutely no way that I could tell them 'no'. Despite my reservations, I found myself nodding along. "No - No. I'll sing," I said, almost immediately regretting it. "Yeah, sure."

Annie smiled. "Thank you."

"Good luck up there," Finnick said, patting me on the back.

"Got any requests?" I asked them.

"Not 'The Hanging Tree'," Finnick said, smiling at me.

"No problem there," I said honestly.

There was only a small stage that the two of them had stood on when they were exchanging vows. Finnick gently placed a hand on my back and nudged me toward the stage. I climbed up and gave a slightly awkward smile as the fiddler dropped off and the dancing lines ceased. Finnick and Annie had asked me for this. The least I could do was comply with their wishes. As I moved to the edge of the stage, Finnick and Annie walked into the middle of the dance floor to get ready to partake in a traditionally romantic dance. All for the Capitol to see. I opened my mouth and let the words flow out.

"Heartbeats fast
Colors and promises
How to be brave?
How can I love when I'm afraid to fall
But watching you stand alone?
All of my doubt suddenly goes away somehow

"One step closer
I have died every day waiting for you
Darling don't be afraid I have loved you
For a thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

"Time stands still
Beauty in all she is
I will be brave
I will not let anything take away
What's standing in front of me
Every breath
Every hour has come to this

"One step closer
I have died every day waiting for you
Darling don't be afraid I have loved you
For a thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

"And all along I believed I would find you
Time has brought your heart to me
I have loved you for a thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

"One step closer
One step closer
I have died every day waiting for you
Darling don't be afraid I have loved you
For a thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more

"And all along I believed I would find you
Time has brought your heart to me
I have loved you for a thousand years
I'll love you for a thousand more."

My throat had begun closing toward the end of the song. With how happy Finnick and Annie looked throughout the song... how could the person singing it be so upset? There was a soft round of applause as I exchanged a low bow with Finnick and Annie. They both quickly rose and joined in on the applause for me. As I headed back to the edge of the stairs I accepted Dean's hand back down to the ground. There was no way that I could keep dancing. My ribs were killing me. I was halfway to the other side of the room - my side still burning with pain - when I was headed off by Seneca.

"You always have had a lovely singing voice," he said.

"Thanks."

I was a little surprised to see him at the wedding. I was surprised to see him anywhere since his announcement about our previous arrangement. "You look happier than you have in a long time," he commented.

"This is one of the few times that I haven't had to pretend. I'm happy for Finnick and Annie," I said, glancing back at them. They were back dancing to a faster song again. "They should have been together for a long time. But I'm happy that they can be together now."

Seneca nodded thoughtfully. "Might I have a dance?"

My eyebrow raised as I stared down at his hand. "Been a long time since we've danced together," I said quietly.

"We've danced as many things. But we've never danced as friends," Seneca pointed out. I nodded. "Shall we?"

"Okay," I conceded.

My ribs were absolutely killing me. I knew that another dance wasn't a wise choice. But Seneca was right. We had never really danced as friends. I had to admit that I was also hoping the cameras would follow us. What would Snow think if he realized that even his most loyal followers could turn on everything he had taught them? The music slowed slightly as Seneca took my hands and pulled me a little closer to the center of the floor. I could see Cressida's camera following everyone. I wondered if they would allow the Districts to see me with dance with Seneca after his announcement.

"How are you handling things?" Seneca asked.

"The wedding, you mean," I put together.

"Yes."

For a moment I looked around. It was nothing compared to the last wedding I'd attended. "It's a little strange to be at a wedding again when the last one I was at was mine. We all know just how well that one ended," I said irritably. Weddings had never been my forte. "But I guess it's kind of nice. I'm happy for the bride and groom. I really am. They love each other. It's nice to see everyone here because they love the bride and groom. Not because they were forced to be here."

"Your wedding, unfortunately, had to be the disguise for something even bigger," Seneca said regrettably. I nodded. It was over and done with. "But that doesn't mean that the two people standing up there didn't love each other."

"We did," I replied.

"You do," Seneca corrected me. "You still love him, correct?"

Why did we always have to play this game? Why wouldn't they just let me die in peace? "Of course. But he's never going to be the same. I want to fight for him and try to remind him of what we were... but... I can't. I can't even speak to him. Be damned for saying it, but I'm afraid of him," I told him.

"Which is understandable. He's much larger than you. More powerful. Quick to anger. Particularly now," Seneca reasoned.

"Was this supposed to help me?" I asked.

Seneca smiled at me. "No one can blame you for not wanting to get hurt even more than you already have been. Both emotionally and physically," Seneca said. There was only so much hurt one person could take, even me. I was positive that I had gotten to the point of being unable to take any more hurt. "But I ask you to remember something; this is a man that you were prepared to die for." My arguments died in my throat. "You met me - who you were terrified of - on the roof before the Quell to risk your own life to find out the secrets to the Games."

It took me a few seconds to put together what he was trying to tell me. He was trying to remind me of the days that I would have gone to the ends of the earth to save Cato. He was asking me to remember the woman who had met a man who had assaulted her just to potentially learn something to save her husband's life. He was right about one thing. I had been prepared to do absolutely anything if it meant saving Cato's life. I would have taken all of the hurt in the world to save him. So, why now, was I so hesitant to continue fighting for him? I hated to admit that I wasn't sure.

"You're trying to get me to remember the man I was willing to fight for," I commented.

"He's still there. Trust me," Seneca said.

Where was he? I certainly hadn't been able to find him the last time I had seen him. Not that struggling, screaming, mess of a man. Whenever my Cato had gone, he was far away. Somewhere unreachable. Unwilling to think about Cato any longer - who cared, honestly? I would be dead soon - I tried to focus my steps clinically on the dance. It could have gone on all night if not for the last event planned in Plutarch's propo. One I hadn't heard about, but then it was meant to be a surprise.

Four people wheeled out a huge wedding cake from a side room. Most of the guests backed up, making way for the rarity, the dazzling creation with blue-green, white-tipped icing waves swimming with fish and sailboats, seals and sea flowers. My hand immediately dropped from Seneca's as I forgot about our dance. I pushed my way through the crowd to confirm what I knew at first sight. As surely as the embroidery stitches in Annie's gown were done by Cinna's hand, the frosted flowers on the cake were done by Cato's.

"Oh my god..." I gasped.

Seneca had followed me through the crowd. "As I said. He's still there somewhere," he whispered in my ear.

"You knew?" I asked shortly.

"You asked only to be updated on Cato's condition when you felt like hearing about it and only from Haymitch," Seneca pointed out.

"Well I would have liked to hear about that," I growled.

It might have seemed like a small thing, but it spoke volumes. Haymitch had been keeping a great deal from me. The boy I last saw, screaming his head off, trying to tear free of his restraints, could never have made this. Never have had the focus, kept his hands steady, designed something so perfect for Finnick and Annie. I wasn't the only one who had noticed the cake. Katniss had stopped dancing with Prim to stare at it. Her eyes scanned the room and met mine. But there were more pressing matters. As if anticipating my reaction, Haymitch was at my side.

"Let's you and me have a talk," he said.

"See you later," I told Seneca blankly.

"Thank you for the dance," he responded.

As we walked through the hall - trying to avoid the celebrating citizens of Thirteen - I caught sight of Cato's family. They were all staring at the cake. I should have known that they would have recognized it. Carrie, Skye, and Alana didn't look that confused. I could only assume that it was because they had all seen Cato relatively recently. But the others looked as confused as I felt. They clearly knew that the cake had been made by Cato and if they hadn't seen him since the last time I had, seeing the cake would have told them the same thing it told me. There had been some development.

Out in the hall, away from the cameras, I asked, "What's happening to him?"

Haymitch shook his head. "I don't know. None of us knows. Sometimes he's almost rational, and then, for no reason, he goes off again. Doing the cake was a kind of therapy. He's been working on it for days. Watching him... he seemed almost like before."

"So, he's got the run of the place?" I asked.

The cowardly feeling from before seeped into my bones. I couldn't believe that I was so terrified of the man who I had once married. But I supposed that it made sense. In those few seconds that Cato had attacked me upon his arrival in Thirteen, he had managed to rupture my vocal cords and almost collapse a lung. He was ten times stronger than I had and if he was gaining back weight and strength... the next time he saw me it would be easy for him to kill me. The idea of him being anywhere near me made me nervous on about five different levels.

"Oh, no. He frosted under heavy guard. He's still under lock and key. But I've talked to him," Haymitch said.

"Face-to-face? And he didn't go nuts?" I asked.

"No. Pretty angry with me, but for all the right reasons. Not telling him about the rebel plot and whatnot." I snorted in agreement. That was one thing that we shared the sentiment about. Haymitch paused a moment as if deciding something. I nodded for him to continue. How much worse could things get at this point? "He says he'd like to see you."

So, it turned out that was how much worse things could get. I was on a frosting sailboat, tossed around by blue-green waves, the deck shifting beneath my feet. My palms pressed into the wall to steady myself. This wasn't part of the plan. Despite my best efforts, I wrote Cato off in Two. Then I was to go to the Capitol, kill Snow, and get taken out myself. The gunshot was only a temporary setback. I was supposed to be in the Capitol in a few weeks and dead a few days after. Never was I supposed to hear the words 'He says he'd like to see you.' But now that I have, there was no way to refuse.

"I can't," I gasped, both terrified and elated at the thought that he might have wanted to see me. He would ruin my plans for Snow. He would either break my heart all over again or end up loving me and stop me from finally dying as I should have so long ago. "All he'll say is something -"

"Listen to me," Haymitch interrupted. "We showed him the footage of your speech in Two. He had real memories of you."

"That still doesn't mean I'm going in there," I argued.

Another injury from another attempted murder would only keep me out of the Capitol for another few weeks. "He's strapped down. He can't hurt you," Haymitch pointed out.

"No. This is different. Haymitch, I really don't want to," I said weakly.

Haymitch was having none of it. "It doesn't matter what you want. It's for Cato," he growled. "What's the harm in trying?"

"You'd be surprised," I replied.

But I knew that Haymitch was right. I had absolutely no right to refuse the very simple request. All I had to do was speak to him for a few minutes. So, with a little more nudging from Haymitch, I headed down to the hospital. I waited a few doors down from Cato's room for a long time speaking to no one. I was trying to figure out what I was supposed to say once those doors opened. But I didn't know. I couldn't treat him like I was in love with him. That could trigger another breakdown. It would have to be a very simple conversation. No strings. A simple chat.

Something that we had never been very good at. In the coming hours Cato's family slowly arrived at the hospital with me. None of them spoke to me. I was glad for it. They knew that I was trying to think I what to say. I could also assume that they were bracing themselves for what they might see. I couldn't blame them for that. The most that any of them did was when Aidan leaned up against my side and intertwined his fingers with mine. I smiled down at him as honestly as I could, refusing to release his hand until the last moment.

Finally, the time came to move on. It was the day of reckoning. At midnight, I found myself standing outside the door to his cell. Hospital room. We had to wait for Plutarch to finish getting his wedding footage, which, despite the lack of what he called razzle-dazzle, he was pleased with. My entire body was trembling from head to toe. I still hadn't thought of what I was supposed to say. I had no idea what I could say to him without triggering some kind of reaction. No one had given me any suggestions. Would I have even taken them?

"The best thing about the Capitol basically ignoring Twelve all these years is that you people still have a little spontaneity. The audience eats that up. Like when Cato announced he had feelings for you or you did the trick with the daggers. Makes for good television," Plutarch said brightly.

It might have felt like I was a million miles away from everyone else but the truth was that there was hardly any room to stand outside of Cato's hospital room. I wished that I could meet with Cato privately. I didn't even want his family there. Mostly since I had no idea what I could expect once I stepped into that room. The audience of doctors had assembled behind the one-way glass, clipboards ready, pens poised. Cato's family and our friends stood just behind them. When Haymitch gave me the okay in my earpiece, I slowly opened the door.

Those brilliant blue eyes locked on me instantly. I found had to remind myself how to walk to actually get me to enter the room. He had three restraints on each arm, and a tube that could dispense a knockout drug just in case he lost control. He didn't fight to free himself, though, as he had with Felix, only observed me with the wary look of someone who still hadn't ruled out that he was in the presence of a mutt. I walked over until I was standing about a yard from the bed. There was nothing to do with my hands, so I crossed my arms protectively over my ribs before I spoke.

The moment that I opened my mouth to say something, all thoughts went out the window. I'd had the beginnings of a speech prepared before I'd walked in here. Apologize for walking away from him before the end of the Quell. Reassure him that it was really me. Thank him for saving my life time-after-time. Convince him that I wasn't a mutt and that I would do anything to help him regain his real memories. But none of that seemed right. Especially not when this was the first time that we would directly speak to each other since saying goodbye at the end of the Quell.

There were no words for this moment. So, I said, "Hey."

Hey, Aspen? That's the best you've got? "Hey," Cato responded.

Well... saying that was better than him losing his mind and attempting to break the binds to kill me. I supposed that we had to start somewhere. It wasn't necessarily what he had said to me. I was amazed that he had said anything at all. Especially with a relatively cool head. It was the way he had said it to me. It was like his voice, almost his voice, except there was something new in it. An edge of suspicion and reproach. I searched the far reaches of my mind for something noncommittal to say to him. We couldn't just stand here and stare at each other forever.

"How are you feeling?" I asked carefully.

Cato gave a humorless laugh that chilled me to the bone. For a moment his laugh had reminded me of... Snow's. "Probably exactly how I look," Cato answered.

There was a sharp edge in his voice that unnerved me. Not quite angry but certainly not happy. "Haymitch said you wanted to talk to me," I said.

"Look at you, for starters," Cato said.

It was like he was waiting for me to transform into a hybrid drooling wolf right before his eyes. I was half expecting his eyes to lock onto my chest or try and follow the lines of my body (a near impossible feat in the unflattering Thirteen jumpsuits) but they didn't linger at any of my curves. Instead, it was like they were trying to look right through me. I remembered the way that he had looked at me when we'd first met. That hunger for me. Perhaps both my death and my body. It wasn't there now.

There was almost nothing in his eyes. Nothing other than curiosity. It was worse than the first time he had looked at me. Because this time I so desperately wanted him to follow the lines of my body. I wanted him to do anything other than just stare in silence. He stared at me for so long I found myself casting furtive glances at the one-way glass, hoping for some direction from Haymitch, but my earpiece stayed silent. It was turned on, though. I could hear the scratching of the doctor's pencils. They just didn't speak. They were letting Cato make the choices of what happened here.

Finally, he spoke. "You're not very big, are you? Or particularly pretty?"

The hair on the back of my neck bristled. I had never taken well to being insulted before. Definitely not by the people I loved. It was half of the reason that I'd fought with Gale so many times over the years. We'd said something nasty about the others and then immediately launched ourselves into a fight. I knew that he had been through hell and back, and yet somehow the observation still rubbed me the wrong way. For a moment it was like we were those two Tributes in the first Games. Constantly fighting. Battling for dominance.

"Well, you've looked better," I answered.

Haymitch's advice to back off got muffled by Cato's laughter. "And not even remotely nice. To say that to me after all I've been through."

"Yeah. We've all been through a lot. And you're the one who was known for being nice. Not me," I told him.

Technically neither one of us had been known for being nice. But he was definitely a lot nicer than I was. He was the one who had always been willing to make allies. I was the one who had drawn on my enemies. Even people would eventually become friends. I knew that I was doing everything wrong here. I knew that I had to calm down and allow him to say what he needed to. I didn't know why I suddenly felt so defensive. He had been tortured! He had been hijacked! What the hell was wrong with me?

But I knew exactly what was wrong with me. Cato was giving me an icy smile. He knew that he had upset me. The two of us had always been like this. The moment that one of us had said something offensive to the other, we had always wanted to say something sharp or biting in response. Neither one of us had ever taken criticism well. It was just the way that we had always been. To each other and everyone else. It was always on display during the first Games but we had continued it to the end of our relationship. It hadn't ended, even now.

Would there ever come a day that we didn't need to constantly be on guard? I didn't think so. Perhaps this was the way we were destined to be. Constantly fighting with each other, never fully relaxed around each other. Never completely able to give ourselves to another person. I guessed that was what happened when you were raised in the richest and poorest Districts in Panem. No love. Only survival. Suddenly, I had a feeling that I might have started to scream at him - I wasn't even sure about what - so I decided to get out of there.

"Look, I don't feel so well. Maybe I'll drop by tomorrow," I told him.

Starting to fight with him would only set back any progress they'd made. I had just reached the door when his voice stopped me. "Aspen. I remember that night on the roof."

The roof. Our one moment of real connection before the Hunger Games. It was the first time that either one of us had spoken to each other as real human beings. It was the one night when we had really shown each other who we were. The night that he had told me about nearly being beaten to death because he'd spared a rabbit during his hunting class. He had really admitted his feelings for me. I had told him about Peeta and my parents. It was just the beginning of a love story I'd never thought I would have. The love story I'd lost.

"They showed you the tape of me talking about it," I said numbly.

"No. Is there a tape of you talking about it? Why didn't the Capitol use it against me?" Cato asked.

So, he was aware that the tapes were being used against him. "I made it the day you were rescued," I answered.

The pain in my chest wrapped around my ribs like a vise. The dancing was a mistake. Or, maybe it was because I was finally being forced to confront my feelings for him. In the absolute worst way possible. That was when it dawned on me. I knew that it was too hard to hear someone on the roof of the Tribute Center. It was why Seneca had wanted to meet there - so no one could hear us. That was probably why they had never bothered showing him that video. He wouldn't have been able to see or hear anything.

"So what do you remember?" I asked, unsure if I wanted to know the answer.

"A long conversation. You told me about the bread that Peeta burned for you. You told me about a black bear chasing you. You told me about the kids you watched get captured in the woods. You told me that I wasn't what you were expecting," Cato said.

For just the briefest moment I thought that I might have heard a real flicker of emotion in his voice. But his eyes remained hard. "That's it. That's what happened. I always wanted to look at you and tell you that I appreciated that night. But I thought that you were playing me. Especially when you were with the Careers. It always seemed like it was still a game to you," I told him.

"I told you that it wasn't," Cato responded, so sure of himself that he surprised even me. "I did everything in my power to keep the Careers away from you. I brought on Peeta to keep them away from you. I let you slip away. I let the others take the night shift so they would fall asleep and let you get away. I took the night shift to talk to you and let you leave."

His voice was slowly regaining that edge that had been in it when he'd spoken to Felix. I was clearly upsetting him. He was upset that I hadn't answered him. I nodded. He did remember that part, at least. I had never spoken about any of those moments aloud. I realized with a little hint of surprise that the Capitol didn't use a lot of those memories against him. Either that or he really did remember a lot of those conversations. Had his recovery been going that well? I couldn't decide which one it was.

"You used me to get the medicine from the attack on the wolf mutt," Cato said.

His voice was slow. He didn't look completely convinced that I wasn't the mutt. "You were the one who suggested that we do that so I could get the medicine. I didn't want to die. I just followed your lead," I told him.

"That was it?" Cato asked.

"I was trying to convince myself that I wasn't in love with you. I couldn't risk it. I thought that I wouldn't survive if I was in love with you," I said honestly.

"That was all that it was about," he said.

"No," I gasped, "it -"

"You used me to get away from the Careers."

This wasn't at all going the way I'd wanted it to. "That wasn't it."

"You hit me multiple times. I do remember that. You attacked me. You dropped the nest of Tracker Jackers on me. I remember you saying some horrible things. You killed my sister."

His voice was becoming angrier and angrier. "I didn't! The Capitol did!" I shouted, finally losing my temper.

All because he was telling the truth. I had killed his sister. Cato was wearing a reasonably amused smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. It was quite unlike his smile that I loved so much. Over my own fuming, I could hear Haymitch warning me to back off again. I knew that he was right. It wasn't fair to be throwing this all back at Cato. He was so confused. I could barely register Haymitch telling me to calm down and that Cato didn't know what was happening. I knew that he was right. I couldn't speak with my heart. I had to speak with my head.

"You killed my child," Cato said.

A lump formed in my throat. "That one I take credit for. But I didn't know that I was pregnant," I said weakly.

It was one of the few times I'd uttered the word aloud. "Was it really mine?" Cato asked.

"Yes," I said sharply. "You were the only person I was ever with."

Cato raised a brow almost playfully. "Is that so?" he asked.

"Yes."

This had to be going somewhere. Cato merely stared at me for a long time. He no longer looked amused or angry. He looked... confused. "Why would I have taken so much pain for you?" Cato asked, genuinely confused.

"Because you were kind and generous," I said, my voice wavering.

"I must have loved you a lot," Cato responded.

"You did." My voice caught and I pretended to cough.

"And did you love me?" Cato asked.

"You know I did," I said tearfully.

Cato smiled bitterly. "Did?"

He caught my mistake before I did. "No, I - I still do," I stammered.

"You don't sound so sure about that," Cato said.

It would have been very hard to say that I was still in love with Cato while he was saying such horrible things to me. I kept my eyes on the tiled floor. "Everyone says I did. Everyone says that's why Snow had you tortured. To break me," I answered quietly.

"That's not an answer. Snow says that everything that comes out of your mouth is a lie," Cato said, his voice momentarily adopting that angry tone again. "My family say you love me. But I don't know if you have them fooled too."

"They're not under some spell. They know me. Just like you used to," I said coldly.

"I don't know what to think when they show me some of the tapes. In that first arena, it looked like you tried to kill me with those Tracker Jackers."

"I was trying to kill all of you. You had me treed. You never said that you were trying to help me."

Cato merely nodded thoughtfully. "There are lots of memories that I can't tell whether or not are real," Cato admitted. "I remember you being a mutt. I remember you stabbing me and trying to eat me. But I still don't know what's real and what's not..."

"None of those things are real," I answered.

He still didn't look convinced. "Later, and even before, there's a lot of kissing. Didn't always seem very genuine on your part."

For a moment I wanted to tell him that I meant every single one of those kisses. But I realized quickly that lying to him would have been completely ineffective. He could always read me. Especially right now. Because I did remember that so many of those kisses were staged. In the arena, the ones at the Closing Ceremonies and in the parties, and on the Victory Tour. None of those had been real. It was the moment when we were alone with no cameras on us that the kisses were real. The ones that were buried in the deepest parts of Cato's mind. Unreachable.

"We had to act in love constantly. We were both in pain. We weren't in the mood to act hopelessly in love," I reasoned with him. There had to be some part of him that remembered those nights that we had spent together. "But I know that you remember those times we were in one of our rooms. Those kisses were real."

Cato still didn't look like he believed her. "Did you like kissing me?" Cato asked.

"Almost all of the time," I admitted. "You know people are watching us now?"

"I know. What about Gale?" Cato continued.

My cheeks burned furiously. I was extremely grateful that Gale hadn't been invited to watch my conversation with Cato and was instead still back at the wedding. I knew that I would never hear the end of that conversation. He would also likely attempt to kill Cato over his latest comment. My anger was returning. Suddenly I didn't care about his recovery - this wasn't the business of the people behind the glass. This was just between the two of us. This wasn't a conversation that I wanted anyone else to overhear. I never had.

"He's not a bad kisser either," I said shortly.

"And it was okay with both of us? You kissing the other?" Cato asked.

"No. It wasn't okay with either of you. But I wasn't asking your permission," I sneered at him.

Cato laughed again, coldly, dismissively. "Well, you're a piece of work, aren't you?"

Yes. He was right. I was a piece of work. I was the kind of person that no one wanted to have in their life. I was the kind of person who anyone would be incredibly unlucky to have fallen into their world. I was about to turn and leave the room. I couldn't be in here any longer. I didn't know if I could ever be in here again. I was already sick of hearing Cato talk to me the way that he was. It was horrible. To have to listen to him hate me and not trust me. He had always loved me. But not anymore. I had my hand around the handle when Cato spoke again.

"What about Seneca Crane?"

I stopped dead in my tracks. "What?"

Very slowly I turned back to him and took a few steps closer. "I saw that video of the two of you together that night," Cato said. But... No. That video would have shown him that we weren't in love. I had been heartbroken. "Talking about how much you hated me. What a fool I was for thinking that you loved me. Telling him that he was the one your heart belonged to."

My fingers twitched. That was how far Snow had distorted his mind... "What you saw was part of the hijacked memory. I never said that," I told him.

"But you were in his bed," Cato reasoned.

"To try and save your family. Snow threatened to have one of your family members killed for each time I refused him. Ask Finnick about it if you don't believe me," I hissed. "They do it to the desirable Victors. I went to save Leah and Marley. They threatened them first."

"We see how well that worked," Cato said.

I scowled at him. "I was heartbroken that night. I went there for you."

Cato merely nodded. "I hear you still talk to him."

Who the hell had been the asshole to tell him that? "He's changed from that night," I argued weakly.

"Or you're still in love with him," Cato said.

"I was never in love with him. You're the only person I've ever been in love with."

This was getting worse and worse by the second. "You told me that first night that we spent together that I was the first man you had ever been with," Cato said, emotionless. My face burned with embarrassment. I didn't want or need all of those people behind the glass hearing about our sex life. "It wasn't true, was it?"

My jaws set. "You wouldn't believe me anyway," I said.

"That's still not a straight answer," Cato said. I never got a chance to answer. "All I know is that I would have saved myself a lot of suffering if I'd just cut your head off in the first Games." I didn't miss the way that his hand clenched, as if searching for the hilt of that sword to relieve my body of my head. His voice adopted a lighter lilt to it. "So, I think the only thing left to say is 'thank you.'"

The tears were building in my eyes. They were all wrong. I could never get Cato back. Not if he had fallen this far. Haymitch didn't protest when I threw the door open and walked out. All eyes were firmly locked on me. They looked furious with Cato and heartbroken for me. I could see Cato's family all talking to each other, looking like they might want to try and speak to me. But I didn't want them near me. I didn't want Katniss near me. I just wanted to be alone. Their attempt to retrieve Cato were useless. He just needed to be far away from me.

Unsure of where I was going, I wandered down the hall. Through the beehive of compartments. Found myself a warm pipe to hide behind in a laundry room. It took a long time before I got to the bottom of why I was so upset. When I finally did, it was almost too mortifying to admit. All those months of taking it for granted that Cato thought I was wonderful were over. He had realized the truth. Finally, he could see me for who I really was. Exactly who I'd once thought he was. Violent. Distrustful. Manipulative. Deadly.

Finally, I understand why I was so hesitant to fight for him. Because he already knew who I was. And I knew it, too. He knew the truth of the woman he had once been so in love with. We couldn't hide from it any longer. Finally, Cato saw that I was the real Career. The one who had manipulated his love for me. The one who had lied to him since the day I'd met him. The one who could never care for anyone the way they deserved. The one who would never really understand love. Not the way he did.

And I hated him for it.

Chapter 18: Chapter Eighteen

Blindsided. I knew the word well enough, but this was the true meaning of it. This was the part of it that I had never truly understood before. Being blindsided by someone you trusted. That was how I felt when Haymitch told me in the hospital. I jumped from my bed, ripping out the needles and saline drip, and flew down the steps to Command, mind racing a mile a minute. Haymitch stumbled after me, likely not expecting me to be able to move as fast as I was right now. I was so distracted by the burning fury that I ended up bursting right into a war meeting.

"What do you mean, I'm not going to the Capitol? I have to go! I'm the Mockingjay! I need to be in the Capitol!" I shouted, ignoring the baffled looks from the men and woman in the meeting.

Coin barely looked up from her screen. "And as the Mockingjay, your primary goal of unifying the Districts against the Capitol has been achieved. You've been very successful as the Mockingjay. And now we want you to rest. And to heal."

"The last the rebels saw me, I was lying on the ground," I snapped.

"We put out the propo to show that you were alive," Plutarch pointed out.

"It wasn't enough!" I yelled. This wasn't an option. I needed to get out of this damn place. I needed to be in the Capitol right now. I was already wasting time. "For all they know I could have been bleeding out right there."

"Aspen, we won't let this momentum go to waste. We'll shoot more propos right here in Thirteen, showing them that you're alive and on the road to recovery," Plutarch said, trying to reason with me.

"I should be with the troops," I told him.

"It'll be like being on the front lines," Plutarch said.

Except that it would be impossible for me to shoot an arrow through Snow's forehead from Thirteen. If I wanted to do that, I literally had to be on the front lines. "As far as the soldiers know, you survived a bullet to the heart," Coin said reassuringly. I scowled at her. That wasn't the goddamn point. "I think they'll understand why you're not with them."

"That's not enough," I growled.

"Don't worry - if it goes well, when we win the war, we'll fly you in for the surrender," Coin continued. "We'll need you for the ceremony. You're very valuable to us."

My value must have been the only reason that they weren't planning on letting me go to the Capitol. They couldn't afford me dying. But I didn't care. There was something that I needed to do. Coin's words bounced around in my head. The surrender? The ceremony? No way. That didn't work for me. By that point, Snow would likely already be taken by the rebel forces to stand trial. But there was a good chance that he would live out his life in prison on some diplomatic immunity. No. I needed him to die a slow and painful death at my hand. No one else's. Certainly not nature's.

"That'll be too late! I'll miss all the fighting," I shouted. I had to give a good reason as to why I would have wanted to go - other than my assassination plot. "You need me - I'm the best shot you've got!"

Everyone in the room didn't even look the slightest bit convinced as to whether or not I was telling the truth or if I was right. But I knew that I was telling the truth. I must have been - by a long shot. I didn't usually brag about that, with the exception of at the start of the first Games, but it had to have been at least close to the truth. I loved shooting but I knew that it had been a long time since I had really taken a practice shot. I was definitely a little weaker and a lot more unhinged these days. I knew that Coin had every right to be reserved.

There had to be another argument - a more human argument - to get Coin on my side. "Gale's going," I pointed out.

"Gale has shown up for training every day unless occupied with other approved duties. We feel confident he can manage himself in the field. How many training sessions do you estimate you've attended?" Coin asked knowingly.

None. That was how many. I'd never even considered attending those training classes. I'd always thought that they were stupid. Now I was paying for it. This was exactly what I deserved for having completely ignored my training schedules over the past few months. The only time I had ever paid moderate attention to them was when they suited me. I had always known that I should have worked with them more often, but I had been so angry with the people in Thirteen that I had deliberately ignored them. This was how they were finally getting back at me for it.

"Well, sometimes I was hunting. And... I trained with Beetee down in Special Weaponry," I argued weakly.

"It's not the same, Aspen," Boggs said, and I immediately knew that he was right. "We all know you're smart and brave and a good shot. But we need soldiers in the field. You don't know the first thing about executing orders, and you're not exactly at your physical peak."

"That didn't bother you when I was in Eight. Or Two, for that matter," I countered.

"You weren't originally authorized for combat in either case," Plutarch sneered, shooting me a look that signaled I was about to reveal too much.

In the heat of the moment, I had almost forgotten that very few people knew that I had blatantly ignored orders in both of those situations and run straight into danger. No, the bomber battle in Eight and my intervention in Two were spontaneous, rash, and definitely unauthorized. The others had only been protecting my rash choices. When it came to Thirteen, I had never really listened to anything they wanted. Everything had been done for my own personal gain. I was just lucky that Coin hadn't caught onto my actions yet.

"And both resulted in your injury," Boggs reminded me.

Suddenly, I saw myself through his eyes. He wasn't wrong. Once I had gotten a piece of shrapnel through the shin and the other time I had taken a bullet straight to the heart. But I was no hero to them. They saw me as I was. A smallish barely twenty-year-old girl who couldn't quite catch her breath since her ribs hadn't fully healed. Disheveled. Undisciplined. Recuperating. Not a soldier, but someone who needed to be looked after. Obviously, they didn't think that I was battle-ready. Even I knew that I wasn't battle-ready. Not that I would ever admit that to him.

Suddenly my mind shot to the other people who had been training over the past few months - even on and off. I wanted to know if the rest of them were being authorized to go out onto the battlefield. At the moment, Gale was the only one I knew about. If they were, I had to be with them. I couldn't just stay here. I couldn't just let someone else do it - although I knew that if I couldn't make it to the Capitol, Katniss would have gladly been the one to kill Snow for me. But this wasn't something that she could do. I had to be the one to do this.

"Is Katniss going?" I asked them.

"Katniss will have to prove herself during the end of training sessions. She missed almost half of the training sessions she should have been attending," Coin explained.

As per usual, they tried to keep Katniss out of the fighting almost as much as they tried to keep me out of it. "She's just as good of a shot as I am!" I barked indignantly.

"But she, like you, doesn't know the first thing about following orders," Coin pointed out.

It was a fair argument. "What about any of the Hadley's?" I asked.

They seemed much more willing to let them go into the fighting. "Dean, Skye, and Julie will be going to the Capitol. They will be in the same squad with Gale," Boggs explained.

So, they were allowing them out there. And I needed to be with them. "That's my brother-in-law! I have to be with them!" I yelled.

That was four people who were going. Katniss would make five if she could. I deserved to be with them. "The three of them have been training since they first arrived in Thirteen," Coin pointed out. I scowled at her. "You won't be alone here. You will be working with the rest of Cato's family to ensure that the Districts know you are still alive and on our side. You can do more here than you ever could in the Capitol."

It was almost impossible to cover up my snort with a cough. That was such a lie. There was nothing more that I could do here other than stew in my misery. I had to get to the Capitol. It wasn't an option. I refused to stay here any longer. I had already wasted too much time here. I had to go. If nothing else, to finally serve Snow his payback for killing all of my friends and family. For what he had done to Cato. I had let enough people do my job for me. There was no way that I would wait here and let someone else do what needed to be my final act.

"But I have to go," I said stubbornly.

"Why?" Coin asked, finally looking up.

All of my comments vanished from my mind. What was a good reason for me to go to the Capitol? I couldn't very well say that it was so I could carry out my own personal vendetta against Snow. Or that the idea of remaining here in Thirteen with the latest version of Cato while Gale and Katniss went off to fight was unbearable. Those would surely erase my deal for the rescued Victors. No matter what he was like, I had to protect Cato. But I couldn't do that here. I needed to go. And I had no shortage of reasons to want to fight in the Capitol.

"Because of Twelve. Because they destroyed my District," I told her.

The president thought about that for a moment. Considered me. As much as I did hate what Snow had done to Twelve, there was a bigger reason that I had mentioned the destruction of my home. Because she knew exactly what it felt like. The Capitol had done the same thing to her home long ago. Before she was born, but I knew that she would understand where I was coming from. Coin stared at me for a long time, as did the others in the room. But the choice was hers. I stared her down, hoping that I looked the slightest bit intimidating and not like a pouting child.

"Well, you have three weeks. It's not long, but you can begin training," Coin finally conceded. "If the Assignment Board deems you fit, possibly your case will be reviewed."

That was it. That was the most that I could hope for. I wanted to scream from happiness, but I knew that it would still be almost impossible for my case to be cleared. I was a mess of a person - physically and mentally. I guessed that most of it was my own fault. I did blow off my schedule every single day unless something suited me. It didn't seem like much of a priority, jogging around a field with a gun with so many other things going on. I had wanted to inconvenience them. Turned out I had only done it to myself. And now I was paying for my negligence.

"I'll do whatever you need me to do," I said.

A few weeks of listening to the guards and trainers would be nothing. I would just have to put up with it. I rose from my chair without another word and turned to glare at Haymitch, who didn't look happy with me. But I was going to the Capitol. No matter what. There was absolutely no way that I would stay here while everyone else fought. I would try and train and see what happened. Maybe I could make it work. But even if they said no, I would still be going. One way or another. I had been through too much to stop now.

Judging by the glare on Haymitch's face, I had a feeling that I would be hearing about my sudden outburst later. Right now, it was a problem for later. I waltzed through the corridors, trying to ignore the searing pain in my ribs. Training shortly after being shot at point-blank range probably wasn't a marvelous idea, but I didn't have a better one. Once I got back to the hospital, I found Johanna in the same circumstance and spitting mad. She was apparently in even worse shape than I was. I quickly told her about what Coin said.

"Maybe you can train, too," I offered.

"Fine. I'll train," Johanna said bitterly. She must have felt the same that I did. We were Victors. We had already proven ourselves. We shouldn't have needed to train. "But I'm going to the stinking Capitol if I have to kill a crew and fly there myself."

"Probably best not to bring that up in training. But it's nice to know I'll have a ride," I said.

Johanna grinned, and I felt a slight but significant shift in our relationship. It was one of the only times that I had gotten a genuine smile from her. I didn't know that it would be safe to say that we were actually friends, but possibly the word allies would be accurate. That was good. I knew that I was going to need an ally. Katniss would be of no help, seeing as she wasn't going to be in the same class. If I wanted someone to spur me on with sharp words as encouragement, there was no better person for me than Johanna Mason.

The night passed quickly in the hospital. It was the first time in a long time that my nightmares didn't focus on Cato. Instead, this time I dreamed that my ribs clawed their way out of my chest. No less disturbing, but at least I didn't have to see his face. Once I had finally washed off and gotten over my nightmare, I walked off to training with Johanna at my side. We were halfway to the training yard when we ran into Katniss. Johanna continued on as I stopped, trying to give my best friend as much of a smile as I possibly could.

"Are you going to the Capitol?" I asked her.

Katniss let out a deep breath. "If I can. Coin says that I haven't been attending enough classes to really get out there. She says I'm not far enough along in training." She stared angrily at the wall behind me, looking as though she was desperate to burn a hole through it. "So, I guess the only thing I can do is train as hard as possible over the next three weeks."

"I'm going," I said determinedly.

"You have broken ribs," Katniss pointed out.

"I don't care," I said stubbornly.

"I know," Katniss responded, smiling fondly at me. I knew that she would have felt the same way if she were in my spot. "I'll help you."

As always, we were in this together. "I'm going to kill Snow," I told her quietly. She nodded. She didn't look happy - more relieved that he would finally be gone. "Nothing good is safe while he's alive. And I can't make another speech about it. No more cameras. No more propos. No more games. He needs to see my eyes when I kill him."

Katniss nodded her agreement. "Whatever it takes. He has to pay for what he's done," she said fiercely. I knew that the conversation wasn't over, so I stood with her in silence, waiting for her to just say it. Eventually, she did. "I know what you're planning to do."

Naturally. It would only make sense. Katniss was my best friend. She was the one person who would have known that I wasn't planning on walking out of the Capitol again. I knew that things would have been the complete reverse if it was Katniss in my spot. She would likely be planning on dying during her crusade to kill Snow. No matter what, I knew that the two of us had always been in this together. The question was if she was willing to go as far as I was. After all, her life hadn't been completely devastated just yet. She still had a chance to change things.

"Figured you would," I answered numbly.

"We promised each other something a long time ago," Katniss said. I stared at her confusedly. "We would always fight together, no matter what the cost."

She couldn't do the same thing I was planning to do. We couldn't both be gone. "They need you," I told her.

Katniss shook her head with a bitter smile. "Not anymore. Prim's all grown up. Mom's finally back to herself," she explained. I supposed that she was right. Just like Cato's family hadn't needed him anymore, ours didn't need us. But that didn't mean that our families were okay without having us. "Who knows? I think we've faced worse odds before." I managed a very slight smile. "We're sisters. I'm with you. No matter what it means."

No matter how long passed, we would always be family. "What training class are you in?" I asked her, desperate to change the subject.

"Mid-level. Putting me with the sixteen-year-olds," Katniss said grouchily.

"Could be worse. I'm with the fourteen-year-olds," I growled.

Katniss smiled bitterly, probably the slightest bit amused that I was now in a lower training class than she was. "How are you doing?" she asked me after a long silence.

Telling her anything but the truth would have been useless. We both knew how bad things really were. "Trying to focus on the only thing that matters right now. Getting to the Capitol and killing Snow," I told her. I'd released Cato back in Two. I couldn't go back on it now. My mind had to be elsewhere. "I can't afford to think about anything else that might distract me."

"I'm really sorry about him, Aspen," Katniss said quietly.

That made two of us... "Thanks, Cat," I muttered. As much as I loved Cato, I had to stick to my guns when it came to releasing him. I knew that I was just holding out false hope otherwise. "I just keep thinking that maybe he'll get better. Not with me. I don't think he'll ever be okay with me again. But maybe he can start to get back to normal with me gone."

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Things might all pan out," Katniss said.

"How much of you believes that?" I asked her sharply.

"Would you rather me tell you that he'll hate you forever?" Katniss offered.

"I'd believe you," I said numbly.

There was a good chance that he would hate me forever. It would be almost impossible to change things now. The two of us stood in silence for a long time. I let out a deep breath as I stared at her. I missed Cato so desperately. I missed those days that I got to be with him. There hadn't even been that many of them. It was so unfair. I wanted to be doing everything and nothing with him. But those days were long behind us. Gone were the days of being a few kids who were in love. No matter what happened, those days were never coming back.

After a long silence, Katniss finally spoke again. "How's Seneca?"

My eyebrow raised. "You care?"

Katniss nodded slowly, still looking rather unsure. "He's become a really good friend to you over the months. If you care about him... I care about him too."

She would never care for him the way that I did, but I was glad that she was at least making the effort. "He was saying that he'll probably relocate after the rebellion is over. They want him out of Thirteen once it's all over. But he doesn't want to go back to the Capitol. He said that he was thinking about Four," I explained to her.

"Lots of water. It'll be pretty. Peaceful," Katniss said thoughtfully.

"That's what I thought," I muttered.

We stood in silence for a while before she spoke again. "Hey. We're both going to get to the Capitol. I promise."

"No matter what it takes," I said quietly.

"No matter what," Katniss agreed. It would just be a matter of time before we found out whether or not we would ever walk back out of it. "Hey. Remember when we were kids and we promised each other that one day we would leave Panem behind?"

The conversation had taken place a long time ago when we were both barely even teenagers. Prim would have never even remembered those chats that we'd had. It was one of the first few times that we had genuinely discussed getting out of Panem. Leaving the Games and the Capitol behind and starting a new life somewhere else. Somewhere that we didn't ever have to remember the horrors and suffering that had plagued our childhoods. I remembered the idea of sailing off into the sunset well. It was an idea that had died with the first Games.

"Of course," I told her.

"Maybe we can do that once this is all over. You and me. Prim and Mom," Katniss suggested. I frowned at her. Perhaps two years ago I would have agreed. Not now. "The four of us can get out of here for a little while. Even if it means taking a few weeks to just live in seclusion. Take a break from this place. Get away from everything for a little while. Things won't be great for anyone in the weeks and months after the rebellion ends."

But I had a different idea. "Cat..." I muttered.

"At least tell Mom and Prim. Tell them," Katniss said seriously. "Remember what we agreed before the first Games ever happened?"

"Give them hope," we said together.

"Yeah, I will," I mumbled.

It would be a miracle if we both actually managed to survive the raid on the Capitol. "If either one of us wants to get to the Capitol, we should probably get to training. It's going to start any minute now," Katniss offered after a few seconds of silence.

"Time to see just how terrible of shape I'm in," I joked weakly.

Maybe I could act quickly during a life-or-death scenario, but training was disciplined. This would be something else entirely. "You've been in great shape your entire life. A few weeks of less movement than usual shouldn't be that hard. It might take a few minutes to get back into being able to work out, but it'll be okay," Katniss said hopefully.

"You're right. Maybe a day or so," I said, knowing that it wasn't the truth.

"Hey," Katniss said, nudging me on the shoulder. "Love you."

"Yeah," I sighed.

"Come on. Say it back," Katniss teased.

"Love you too," I finally conceded.

No matter what happened, I did love her. She would always be one of the most important people in my life. The two of us stood together for a long time before Katniss moved forward to wrap me in a hug. I wanted to pull away almost immediately. I didn't want to touch anyone right now. But the moment that Katniss's arms wrapped around me, I melted into my little sister. I had always tried to pretend to be so tough - and sometimes I really was - but I had refused help for so long. I needed it right now.

She was what I needed right now. The truth was, she was the person I always needed. For as much as I had loved other people and fallen in love with one particular person, there had always been one constant in my life. Even long before Cato had ever made his way into it. My sisters and my mother. The three people that I would have never been able to truly let go of. The three people that I desperately needed right now. I breathed out softly into Katniss's shoulder as she stroked my unruly hair back over my shoulders.

"I love you, Cat," I muttered honestly.

"I love you too, Aspen," Katniss replied.

We both gave earnest - albeit weak - smiles as we pulled apart. "Good luck today," I told her.

"Yeah. You too. Let me know how it goes."

"If I'm still alive, will do," I teased.

We both laughed loudly as I walked off. There was a good chance that we would both be a pile of mush by the end of the day. I supposed that I would see later. The area where Katniss was training was on the other side of Thirteen. We wouldn't see each other again until tonight. Right now, Katniss looked absolutely miserable that she would have to actually train like a real Thirteen soldier for the next few weeks. I understood her position completely. I hated this. I was about halfway through my walk when I spotted Dean. He looked like he was heading in the same direction.

"Hey, Dean," I called.

Dean turned to me and arched a brow curiously. "Aspen," he greeted, waiting for me to come up to his side. "What are you doing out here?"

"I'm heading to training," I answered.

Dean stared at me blankly. "Seriously?"

"If I want to go to the Capitol, I only have a few weeks to prepare. I have to be able to pass the final tests."

Dean's eyes turned down sadly. "Oh, Aspen... You have a bruised lung and ribs and a whole other list of injuries. Let's not forget about the concussion," Dean said.

"Oh, yeah, can't forget that one," I huffed.

"What I'm trying to say is that you might not be ready for this one," Dean corrected himself. I let out a deep breath. I should have known that he was going to argue this one with me. "I know that you want to be there but it's one of the most dangerous places for you to be right now. You're public enemy number one. The moment you set foot in the Capitol, all guns will be on you."

"I don't care," I said determinedly.

"Aspen -"

"You know what he did," I interrupted angrily. Dean nodded slowly. This wasn't just about me. This was about everyone Snow had hurt. "Not just to me, but to everyone else. They won't do it. There'll be a trial and he'll get some kind of diplomatic immunity. Or the whole process will take too long. He's already old and ailing. He'll get to live out the rest of his life awaiting his punishment. That can't happen. I need to be the one to do it. I need to look him in the eyes when I kill him. I need to see him take his last breath."

Dean was silent for a long time. He knew exactly what I was telling him. Not just that I planned on assassinating the president, but that I also wasn't planning on coming back. Either dying myself in the Capitol or getting myself imprisoned for life. At that point, I would have rather committed suicide. Either way, I wasn't walking out of the Capitol. I was smart enough to know that. So was he. I thought about trying to convince him that my comment had been in the heat of the moment but I quickly decided against it. He wasn't fool enough to believe that.

Finally, Dean managed to find his words. "You're aware of what that might mean for you?"

"I know," I said tonelessly.

"You're still so young," Dean argued weakly.

"I've done enough in my life. Been through a lot," I told him. I'd seen everything I needed to see - and far more. "But there's one thing I've never truly felt. Peace."

"You don't have to be dead to have peace."

"Haven't had it when I was alive."

"Don't give up yet," Dean told me desperately. I merely stared at him. He wasn't talking me out of this. Dean let out a deep breath and gently rested his hand against my arm, pushing me forward." I raised a brow at him. "Come on. If you want any chance of getting to go to the Capitol, you can't miss any more training sessions."

"What are you doing going to training for the beginners?" I asked curiously.

"I'm a trainer," Dean answered.

My face flushed. No matter what, I still had my pride, and this was definitely a damaging moment. "My brother-in-law is training me... Okay, that's kind of embarrassing," I said, laughing awkwardly.

"Come on," Dean said, nudging me along. "I promise to only laugh a little bit."

"You're an asshole," I snapped.

Dean grinned. "Where do you think -?"

His voice dropped off as all color drained from his face. "Cato got it from?" I offered quietly, knowing that he wouldn't speak.

Dean moved forward but didn't touch me. I knew that he was embarrassed for what he had just said. "I'm - I'm really sorry, Aspen," he stammered. "I didn't think before I said it and -"

"I'm not upset with you, Dean," I interrupted. We would be here all day if I wanted to wait for him to get his apology out. Either way, there was nothing to apologize for. "I get it. It's hard not to talk about him. He's your brother. He was my husband." Dean frowned at my wording. "I can't just expect that no one will ever mention him to me again."

Dean shifted awkwardly. "Don't think about him right now."

"Not a second has passed that I haven't thought about him," I said honestly.

We stared at each other for a long time. There was nothing left to say after that. Talking about Cato was tough. It always would be. "Come on. You'll be late if we don't hurry," Dean said, gently nudging me along.

Unfortunately, the moment we reported for training at seven-thirty, reality slapped me in the face. We had been funneled into a class of relative beginners, fourteen or fifteen-year-olds, which seemed a little insulting until it was obvious that they were in far better condition than we were. Gale and the other people who had already chosen to go to the Capitol were in a different, accelerated phase of training. Skye and Julie were also in the advanced training phase. Everyone else would be remaining in Thirteen for most of the final invasion of the Capitol.

It was definitely embarrassing that Dean was going to be there, watching my every move, and ultimately judging just how well I was doing. I hoped that he wouldn't watch me too closely. I didn't want him to think that I was a weakling. Even though he definitely knew by now that I was tough. I supposed that it didn't help that the bitter part of me didn't want it somehow getting back to Cato that I couldn't even get through some simple training exercises - a thought that I was mortified to admit to myself.

It didn't take long at all for me to realize that soldier training in Thirteen was very much like the Career training that Cato had once told me about. There was likely a very good reason for that. These people in Thirteen were supposed to be top-notch soldiers. They simply didn't have as many fighters as the Capitol did. That meant that they had to ensure that theirs were at least better trained. From what I could see, so far even the kids were better trained. They were putting me to shame.

After we stretched - which hurt - there were a couple of hours of strengthening exercises - which hurt - and a five-mile run - which killed. Within an hour of being in training (a ten hour day) I already wanted to drop dead. Dean knew it. He spent most of his time telling me that I could do it, hovering around me. He was definitely being tough with me but I knew that it was out of love. Even with his consistent growls to move faster and Johanna's motivational insults driving me on, I had to drop out after a mile.

A mere second later, Dean was at my side. "Come on, soldier! Back to it!" Dean shouted.

"I - I can't," I wheezed.

The air wouldn't go back into my lungs, no matter how hard I tried. I couldn't breathe. "You're not getting out of it that easily. Take my arm," Dean offered, his gaze softening for a moment.

"Dean..." I mumbled.

"Now!" Dean snapped, back to his prior self.

Now I saw where Cato got his domineering personality from... I grabbed onto Dean's arm and allowed him to yank me along with him. He was doing most of the work. The muscles in my legs certainly weren't as strong as they had once been (my legs throbbed and the muscles pulsated with each step) but that wasn't the real problem right now. The problem was that my ribs were contracting horribly with each step I took - even once I slowed to a walk. My lungs and ribs couldn't take the pain much longer.

"I've got to stop," I eventually gasped, collapsing to my knees.

"Two miles, Aspen. Three more to go," Dean prompted. I couldn't believe that I had even managed it that far. "Come on!"

I tried to imagine that Snow was in front of me, that running to him would finally allow me to kill him, but even that wasn't enough to override the pain. "I can't. My ribs can't take it," I finally admitted.

Dean's face softened again. "Okay. Alright. Take a breather," he said, patting me on the back.

I nodded, collapsing to the ground. It felt like something had snapped in my legs. Was it the bone? I wouldn't have been that surprised. Dean stayed at my side long enough to grab me under the arms and help me limp over to the bleachers that we were allowed to rest on. So far, I was the only person sitting on them. I frowned as Dean patted me on the knee and went back to the rest of the runners. A stab of disappointment shot through me. I'd thought that I was better than this.

It wasn't long before a figure appeared at my side. I frowned up at the disappointed look I was receiving. "It's my ribs," I explained to the trainer, a no-nonsense middle-aged woman we were supposed to address as Soldier York. "They're still bruised."

There were some other problems, but the ribs were the ones that were hurting the most and keeping me from really working. "Well, I'll tell you, Soldier Antaeus, those are going to take at least another month to heal up on their own," Soldier York said.

I shook my head. "I don't have a month."

She looked me up and down. "The doctors haven't offered you any treatment?"

"Is there a treatment? They said they had to mend naturally," I told her.

"That's what they say. But they could speed up the process if I recommend it," Soldier York said. I immediately perked up. Why the hell hadn't anyone told me about that? "I warn you, though, it isn't any fun."

"Please. I've got to get to the Capitol," I said.

At this point, whatever pain that was coming my way would be nothing. I was used to it by now. What was the worst that they could really throw at me? Soldier York didn't question my last statement. She knew that everyone here - me, in particular - had every reason to want to be there for the invasion. She scribbled something on a pad and sent me directly back to the hospital. I hesitated. I didn't want to miss any more training. I was already at the very bottom of the class and couldn't afford to keep falling.

"I'll be back for the afternoon session," I promised.

She just pursed her lips. I rolled my eyes and turned the other way. I'd be just fine. Maybe it would hurt for a little while, but that would be fine. I was used to things hurting. A few hours out of training before I could come back and grit my teeth through the pain. A day or two and I would be back to normal. That was a good enough plan. Johanna watched me leave. She gave me a reassuring nod as I promised that I would be back once my ribs were healed. I was almost back into the hallway when I was cut off by Dean.

"Where are you going?" Dean asked curiously.

"Oh, Soldier York was just telling me about some kind of process that'll help my ribs heal up a lot faster. Not sure what it is but she wrote me a note to authorize the treatment," I explained, handing him the piece of paper.

Dean scanned over it for a moment before handing it back, a frown marring his face. "Aspen, I'm not so sure that you'll want to go through with it," Dean said. I scowled at him. This was my ticket back to the Capitol. I had to go through with it. "That's a tough treatment. Most of the toughest male soldiers won't even go through with it."

"So, I'll be something special," I said carelessly.

Dean smiled. "You certainly are."

Much to my own surprise, even I smiled. Dean called back to Soldier York that he would return in a few minutes as he wrapped an arm around my back and helped me limp downstairs. My legs now felt like jelly and my ribs seemed to be straining against my lungs. Dean helped me down the stairs onto the hospital floor before letting me know to head back to my room there. At this point, I really might as well have just made my permanent residence there. I had lived more in the hospital than I had lived anywhere else in Thirteen.

It had become quite clear to me - especially with Dean's interest in my training - that Cato's family had been trying extremely hard to make me feel better about things. In their own way, Cato's family had been wonderful. But, for the most part, I had a hard time facing them. It wasn't easy. I always saw Cato in them. I didn't want his family to realize just how twisted things were in my mind these days. I was almost back to the hospital wing when I ran back into Carrie, who I had tried to avoid since our conversation about kids a few days ago.

"Aspen," Carrie greeted happily, pulling me in for a hug. I smiled weakly at her, cringing at the searing pain in my ribs. "I thought that you were back in training. Well, in training for the first time, actually. Dean told me this morning."

"I was. But we had to do a five-mile run and I made it a mile originally. Dean got me to keep going for another mile but I couldn't keep going after two. The bruised ribs are too painful. They said it would take a month to heal up on their own. There's no way that I can wait a month. I've only got three weeks before we all start deploying to the Capitol," I explained. Carrie nodded. "So, Soldier York gave me permission to do some procedure to help heal myself quicker."

Suddenly, the smile on her face vanished. "Aidan was telling me about that. Apparently, he helps out with Prim sometimes in the hospital with it. It's painful, Aspen," Carrie told me.

"In my life, what isn't?" I offered.

She frowned. "I'll come with you if you want," Carrie offered. I arched a brow. "Could be nice to have some support."

"Doubt it'll be that bad," I said carelessly. Carrie looked saddened by my denial. "But, yeah, okay. Come on."

The two of us headed out toward the hospital. Carrie laid an arm around my waist to ensure that I didn't have to put all of my pressure down on my legs, which were still incredibly sore. Once we had arrived back in my hospital room, I walked up to one of the nurses and handed over the slip that Soldier York had given me. The nurse read it over and immediately looked back down at me. She looked at me doubtfully but told me to lay down on the hospital bed anyway. I did so and stared up at the ceiling as I waited. Carrie was in the chair next to me.

The nurse was wandering back and forth as she prepared the... whatever it was. "Just a few things we have to ensure of before we can put you through the procedure," the nurse said, looking down at her clipboard.

"What's that?" I asked.

"There are a couple of medications I can't have you on, no prior seizures, no heart problems, and no pr -"

"She doesn't have any of those," Carrie interrupted. I looked up at her and narrowed my gaze. One day I would have to learn to get used to hearing people mention pregnancies. "She's clean."

"Ready to get started?" the nurse asked me.

"Sure. How bad can it be?" I said.

Twenty-four needle jabs to my rib cage later, I found out just how bad it could be. I was laying, flattened out on my hospital bed, gritting my teeth to keep from begging them to bring back my morphling drip. It had been by my bed so I could take a hit as needed. Before this, I had known that I couldn't take it. If I did, I would have had to go through the detox process again, which certainly hadn't been pleasant. I hadn't actually used it lately, but I had lately been keeping it for Johanna's sake. She used more than enough for two people.

Just before starting the procedure today, they had tested my blood to make sure it was clean of the painkiller, as the mixture of the two drugs - the morphling and whatever it was that had set my ribs on fire - apparently had dangerous side effects. The doctors and nurses had made it clear that I would have a difficult couple of days. But I told them to go ahead. For a brief moment, I wished that I would have just put up with the pain in my ribs during training. That was much easier than having to deal with this.

To keep Carrie from asking me any questions or worrying about me, I had been pretending to be asleep. Even when Johanna had come in from training for the night, I had squeezed my eyes shut and ignored her. She must have known that I was awake, as I was trembling and sweating, but she ignored it and went to bed. Nearing the middle of the night, I found myself wishing desperately that I could just smash myself over the head to pass out. But I couldn't. I was wide awake. Even when the door to my hospital room opened.

"Carrie?" Dean's voice called. There was some rustling from her side of the room. "Come to bed."

"I can't. I promised Aspen that I would stay with her," Carrie replied quietly. "I know that Johanna's here, too, but I think it helps to have someone around who can motivate them to keep going."

"She actually went through with it?" Dean asked.

"Who can be surprised? She wants to get to the Capitol."

"To kill Snow."

"Yeah," Carrie agreed. They sat in silence for a while before Carrie spoke again. "Did you talk to Cato today?"

"For a few minutes," Dean said. I had to resist flipping over to look at them. I didn't know that the doctors were letting any of Cato's family speak to him regularly. I didn't know that he was stable enough. "They don't let any of us have more than five minutes. That's about as long as he can hold it together most of the time. But it was a good five minutes."

"What happened?" Carrie asked.

"A lot of conversation about his teachers and life back in Two. We talked about you. We talked about that game he used to like to play when he was little."

"Did you mention Aspen?"

"He did."

"He did?" Carrie asked curiously.

To attack me, more than likely. "It's weird, Carrie. She's one of the only people or things he genuinely wants to talk about. Sometimes I think he'll be okay. I think he's just confused. He wants to know what memories of her are real and what ones aren't. Sometimes he's got real memories. He thinks about those nights that they spent together, away from the cameras," Dean whispered. My heart nearly stopped. Did he know about those? "But something triggers him. A mention of Seneca Crane or the thought of Gale or anything having to do with Leah and Two and the Games."

"That sets him off?" Carrie asked.

"Yeah."

There was another long silence before Carrie spoke again. "What do you think?"

Finally, someone would tell me the truth. Even if they didn't know that they were. "He's not the same. I don't know if he ever will be," Dean admitted. "I just hope she doesn't give up on him. With time... I think they could get there."

"I just want him to be happy. I want them both to be happy together. She's come to be like a sister to me. To all of us, I think," Carrie said sadly.

"She is. We've just gotta get her back to my brother," Dean said.

I let out a deep breath. This definitely wasn't something that anyone was going to let go. "You should go," Carrie eventually said. "I don't want to wake her up."

"Give her my best. I'll see you in the morning," Dean said.

"Goodnight, love," Carrie replied.

At least someone was happy. I liked the two of them together. They were some of the few people who actually seemed happy to be together. There was nothing but love between them. When Dean finally left, Carrie still didn't say anything to me. She merely leaned back in the chair and went to sleep. But I didn't and neither did Johanna, who I knew was also awake. She had likely just overheard that entire conversation. But I was in way too much pain to even think about Johanna's interest in my story. It was a conversation that I would handle later.

It was definitely a bad night in our room. Sleep was out of the question for both me and Johanna. I thought that I could actually smell the ring of flesh around my chest burning, and Johanna was fighting off withdrawal symptoms. Eventually, I gave up pretending to sleep and stayed up with Carrie. Early on, when I apologized about cutting off Johanna's morphling supply, she waved it off, saying it had to happen anyway. But by three in the morning, Carrie and I were the targets of every colorful bit of profanity District 7 had to offer.

During the following few hours, I knew that Carrie was being as helpful as she possibly could. She got Johanna everything from glasses of water to simple pain pills, which Johanna slapped away with a number of nasty - albeit rather impressive - curses. Carrie tried to keep our minds off of the pain with idle chitchat, but nothing worked. Talking made things even worse. The more that Carrie spoke, the angrier Johanna got. Eventually, we resigned ourselves to just waiting out the rest of the evening in silence. At dawn, Johanna dragged me out of bed, determined to get to training.

"I don't think I can do it," I confessed.

"You can do it. We both can. We're Victors, remember? We're the ones who can survive anything they throw at us," Johanna snarled at me.

Carrie laid a hand on my arm. "Come on, Aspen. You can do it. You've always been able to do it. Prove Snow wrong about you. Prove to him that you can beat him. He can't kill you or keep you down," Carrie said quietly.

She was right about one thing. Snow couldn't kill me. He wasn't going to keep me down. I was going to get up and go to training this morning, just as I had promised Soldier York I would. Snow was wrong about me. He couldn't destroy me. Not until I got my revenge. I turned slowly to look at Johanna, who was still glaring at me. That was when I realized that she was a sick greenish color, shaking like a leaf. She was having a much harder time with her withdrawals than I had. I turned back and got dressed.

We must have been Victors to make it through the morning. Every move sent a searing pain through my chest. My head spun with each step. My legs threatened to give out once we made it to the stairs. But between the two of us, and with Carrie around, who had refused to leave us alone, we were somehow able to make it to the training yard. Although, I thought that I was going to lose Johanna when we realized that it was pouring outside. Her face turned ashen and she seemed to have ceased breathing.

"It's just water. It won't kill us," I told her sternly.

Johanna clenched her jaw and stomped out into the mud. Much to my surprise, Carrie followed us out. Rain drenched us as we worked our bodies and then slogged around the running course. I bailed after two miles again, even with Dean's insults and Carrie's gentle urging, and I had to resist the temptation to take off my shirt so the cold water could sizzle off my ribs. I did lay down on my back so that it could hit me more directly. Later on, I forced down my field lunch of soggy fish and beet stew. Johanna got halfway through her bowl before it came back up.

Dean and Carrie were definitely good for motivation throughout the day. But their teaching styles were much different. Carrie was kind and quiet, trying to gently assist me with the pain in my ribs. Dean, on the other hand, continuously shouted at me that I wasn't working hard enough and that I could do more. It was the Academy in him. The entire thing was tough love but it was also exactly what I needed to make it through the day. The biggest problem was that it actually felt like my ribs were going to cave in on themselves. It felt like my body was slowly killing me.

In the afternoon, we learned to assemble our guns. I managed it after a while, but Johanna couldn't hold her hands steady enough to fit the parts together. When York's back was turned, I helped her out. I was sure that Carrie caught me doing so, but she made no mention of it. She only smiled at us and pulled Dean to the other end of the firing range. Even though the rain continued, the afternoon was an improvement because we were on the shooting range. At last, we were doing something that I was good at.

It definitely took some adjusting from a bow to a gun. The kickback wasn't what I was expecting. There was almost nothing when I fired a bow, but the gun was nearly knocked from my hands on the first few shots. While Johanna was managing to use the gun, none of her shots appeared to actually be hitting the targets. But she was managing. For me, though, I finally felt like I might have stood a real chance at getting to the Capitol. By the end of the day, I had the best score in my class. Not that it was that impressive when I was around a bunch of fourteen-year-olds, but still.

We were just inside the hospital doors when Johanna declared, "This has to stop. Us living in the hospital. Everyone views us as patients."

"You're right," I agreed. She was right. We looked so pathetic every time we came back here. "Come on. Let's see if they'll discharge us."

As it turned out, there was no argument for us to be discharged. It definitely wasn't a problem for me. I could move into our family compartment, but Johanna had never been assigned one. She had lived in the hospital since returning from the Capitol. When she tried to get discharged from the hospital, they wouldn't agree to let her live alone, even if she came in for daily talks with the head doctor. I thought that they might have finally put two and two together about the morphling and this only added to their view that she was unstable.

"She won't be alone. I'm going to room with her," I announced.

All jaws in the room dropped. Even Johanna's. We hadn't exactly crossed the line into friends yet, but I wanted to be there for her right now. She was my ally. And, who knew? Maybe there was a chance that we could become friends. I certainly had a shortage of those. There was some dissent about our potential rooming, as we had never really seen eye-to-eye before, but Haymitch took our part, and by bedtime, we had a compartment across from Prim, Katniss, and Ms. Everdeen, who agreed to keep an eye on us.

After moving into our new room and taking a quick shower, I started wandering through the hallways. I wasn't sure what I was doing. I just couldn't sit still right now. I needed to go do something else. I needed to feel like I was making some progress. Walking at least made the pain in my legs even worse. That helped to distract me from the searing pain in my ribs. The legs were easier to deal with. I was about halfway through my aimless wandering of Thirteen when I ran into Seneca. I hadn't seen him in a few days. He had been handling the upcoming attack on the Capitol.

He was the best person for it. He knew their ins and outs. I gave him a halfhearted smile as we met in the middle of the hallway. "I hear you had your ribs fused," Seneca said, probably noting the look of pain on my face.

"Is that what that fucking thing was that they did to me?" I hissed.

"Last I heard, you were the one who asked them to do it," Seneca said.

"I thought it'd be slightly less painful," I admitted.

Seneca let out a deep breath as he laid a hand against my arm. "Don't ever underestimate just how painful those kinds of procedures are. The main reason you didn't feel anything when they healed you back in the Capitol after the Games is that you were on heavy pain medication and you were knocked out through most of it," he explained.

"Trust me, I wish I could have the morphling back," I groaned.

"You don't. You'll have to go through detox again and I don't think you enjoyed it very much the first time."

"Still... I can't take this much longer."

The pain was almost unbearable. All of it. Inside and out. "Look at me," Seneca said sternly. He grabbed my hand and pulled me into him. I groaned in pain again as I stumbled straight into his chest. He kept a hand against my waist to keep me from falling or my legs from giving out. "You can do this... You've been through worse. This is nothing. Just a little setback."

He was, as always, correct. I couldn't go through the withdrawal process again. "Okay... Yeah, you're right. Made it this far. I'm not going back," I admitted to him.

"The fusion is one of the most painful processes they have in the Capitol," Seneca explained.

"Oh, I highly doubt that," I said.

Seneca's face dropped as a guilty stare fell over his face. "Aspen, I -"

"It's fine, Seneca," I told him. His involvement in the Games didn't even occur to me that often these days. "At this point, I'm used to it."

The two of us stood in slightly awkward silence for a little while. Seneca eventually figured out where to redirect the conversation. "We hear you moved in with Johanna," he said.

"Yeah, I did. Tonight is going to be the first night," I told him. Seneca gave me an incredulous look. "I think by now I can trust her not to stab me while I sleep."

"You're braver than me," Seneca teased.

We all knew by now that Johanna would have never been able to take me. Not that I really would have been able to take her right now. We were both useless in a real fight. Right now, at least. Currently, I was shaking and had already broken out in a thin veil of sweat. No. I definitely wasn't strong right now. I knew that I couldn't go back on the morphling drip - they would pull me from training immediately if they realized that I was getting dependent on the medicine again - but that didn't change the fact that I was so desperate to have it.

Finally, I looked up and realized that I actually had no idea where I was. "Where am I?" I asked dumbly.

"Nearing Command," Seneca answered blankly. "Was there something you were looking for?"

"No. Actually, I don't know what I was doing," I answered honestly.

"Come along. Let's get you back," Seneca said.

But I didn't really want to go back. Right now, I really wanted to wander the halls aimlessly. I was annoyed and angry and didn't want to try and force myself to go to sleep, the pain still radiating roughly through my chest. But I wasn't in the mood to argue with him, so I nodded my agreement. Seneca wrapped an arm around my shoulders as he walked me back toward my new room. Some of the people in the halls gave us scrutinizing stares. I knew that no one was comfortable with the idea that we were friends. But I didn't care. I was just glad to have him around.

Since I was mostly blind to where we were going, Seneca walked me all the way back to my compartment. It was a good thing that he was doing all of the hard work because, at the rate that I was going, I would have never made it back. As we approached the door, Seneca helped me limp back inside. Much to my surprise, Johanna didn't seem to have even bothered to try and take a shower yet. But she did give us a quick glance before walking into the bathroom for a moment to give us some privacy to say goodbye. Johanna closed the bathroom door behind her but I never heard the water run.

"Thanks for walking me back. But I can handle myself from here," I joked, motioning over to my bed.

"Goodnight, Aspen," Seneca said.

"Goodnight, Seneca," I replied.

The two of us stared at each other for a long time. There was something unsaid here but I wasn't sure what it was. Seneca smiled weakly at me and leaned down to press a small kiss against my cheek. Much to my surprise, for just the briefest of seconds, I felt my stomach lurch slightly. It was the same feeling that I had once gotten whenever I was around Cato. Not nearly to that magnitude, but it was definitely there. And I knew that Seneca felt it too. But he didn't act on it. He merely smiled at me before turning and leaving, only stopping in the doorway for just a second.

"I'll check on you soon," Seneca said.

"Thank you. For everything," I told him.

He grinned again before turning and leaving the bedroom. Mere moments later, the door to the bathroom opened and Johanna emerged. I was incredibly grateful that she didn't ask me any questions about Seneca. She still hadn't showered. Johanna simply sort of wiped herself down with a damp cloth as some form of a bath. Afterward, she made a cursory inspection of the place, slowly padding her way around the small room. When she opened the drawer that held my few possessions, she shut it quickly.

"Sorry," Johanna said quickly.

It was perhaps the only thing in the entire room that had something that genuinely belonged to either one of us. The things in there were definitely private, but when was the last time that my private life had really been private, after all? If anyone deserved something to see, it was Johanna. I thought about how there was nothing in Johanna's drawer but her government-issued clothes. That she didn't have one thing in the world to call her own. I wanted to ask her about where her family had gone, but this was the wrong time. This was my time to be open.

"It's okay. You can look at my stuff if you want," I told her.

Johanna unlatched my locket, studying the pictures of Gale, Prim, Katniss, and Ms. Everdeen. It was the first time that I'd noticed that none of them were smiling in their portraits. She opened the silver parachute and pulled out the spile and slipped it onto her pinkie. Out of the few things I still had, I couldn't believe that was one of them. Johanna's gaze quickly shot down to the few remnants in the drawer. The picture of us at our wedding, Cato's sketch of me on the rooftop, and my wedding ring were pushed toward the back. Remnants of another time, I thought.

"Cato drew this?" Johanna asked quietly, gently raising the paper.

"Yeah," I answered thickly.

"It's really good," Johanna said.

"I told him the same thing," I said.

Johanna nodded and placed the paper back down. A second later she gently picked up the ring, looking almost like she was afraid that she would break it. She fingered the feather band. "You kept this?" she asked tensely.

It was one thing I didn't think that I could ever get rid of. It meant too much to me. "Just a memory of a good time in my life. I wore it right up until..." I said, my voice eventually giving out and dropping off. Johanna nodded understandingly, placing the ring back in the drawer. "Took it off when I realized that things wouldn't ever be the same."

"Sorry," Johanna muttered.

"Me too," I said.

Johanna picked up the spile again. A small grin tilted up on her lips. "Makes me thirsty just looking at it." Then she found the pearl Cato gave me. "Is this -?"

"Yeah. Made it through somehow," I interrupted.

My tolerance for talking about Cato had come to an end. I could never seem to stop thinking about Cato. He was always in my mind, one way or another. But it was almost impossible to talk about him without getting upset. He was too hard to think about. Talking about him was unbearable. I didn't want to talk about Cato. Not now and likely not ever. One of the best things about training was, it kept me from thinking of him. At least during the times that we were in the training field. Otherwise, I always seemed to be thinking about him.

"Haymitch says he's getting better," Johanna said.

"Maybe. But he's changed," I said.

"So have you. So have I. And Finnick and Haymitch and Beetee. Don't get me started on Annie Cresta. The arena messed us all up pretty good, don't you think? Or do you still feel like the girl who volunteered for your friend's sister?" Johanna asked.

"No," I answered honestly.

"That's the one thing I think my head doctor might be right about. There's no going back. So we might as well get on with things," Johanna said. I nodded at her. She was right. It was time to move on. One way or another. Johanna neatly returned my keepsakes to the drawer and climbed into the bed across from me just as the lights went out. "You're not afraid I'll kill you tonight?"

"Like I couldn't take you," I answered, dropping into the other bed.

Then we laughed, since both our bodies are so wrecked, it would be a miracle if we could get up the next day. But we did. Each morning, we did. Not an easy task, but somehow, we managed. Seneca stayed at my side a lot of the time, just helping me keep my morale up. Katniss helped me try and advance through the rankings even quicker. Dean would give me slightly cruel but very effective motivation. Skye and Julie took time out of their own training to help me. By the end of the week, my ribs felt almost like new, and Johanna could assemble her rifle without help.

Much to my own surprise, I turned to Johanna and gave her a little smile. Somehow, we might actually manage to get out to the Capitol. We both had weight to put on, needed to steady our hands, and learn how to take orders, but this was a good start. In fact, I hadn't heard Dean be so complimentary to someone since starting training. Soldier York gave the pair of us an approving nod as we knocked off for the day. It was the first time I had seen her look even moderately impressed.

"Fine job, Soldiers."

When we moved out of hearing, Johanna muttered, "I think winning the Games was easier."

But the look on her face said that she was pleased. So was I. For the first time in a while, a real smile appeared on my face. As we passed the edge of the training field, I noticed that Seneca had been lingering in the doorway, watching us. Watching me, more appropriately. My smile faded as I watched him. His gaze was on the target I had been using. The center of the target was missing from how many times I had managed to hit it. He gave me a slight nod as he turned and walked back into the hallway. My smile returned.

Cato's P.O.V.

Cato found himself sitting in the middle of the bed in his hospital room. He didn't know what time it was. It could have been in the middle of the day. It could have been the middle of the night. There was no clock in the room. The minutes simply ticked away. Cato picked at the skin surrounding his thumbnail. His hands were still bound but they were no longer chained down to the bed. He could slightly move around. He was grateful for that much, at least. It had been months since he was able to actually sit up in his own bed.

There was a very slight knock on the door. Cato didn't bother to speak. It didn't matter whether or not Cato actually wanted them to enter. They would do whatever they wanted. But Cato did glance up. The doctors that had been taking care of him over the past few months entered the room, not even looking at him. He had become quite accustomed to seeing them. But, much to his surprise, Carrie entered behind them. Cato stared at her. He hadn't seen his sister-in-law in a few weeks. It was strange to see her now. She smiled at him.

"Hey, sweetie," Carrie greeted happily.

"Hi, Carrie," Cato responded.

"How are you feeling?" Carrie asked.

"Fine," Cato answered honestly. "How'd they like the cake?"

Carrie's eyes brightened slightly. "Oh, Annie and Finnick loved the cake. It was a big hit. No one in Thirteen's had sugar like that in a long time," she responded happily. Cato nodded. He had actually almost enjoyed making the cake. It was the only time he had actually been unbound. "I think they would come and thank you themselves but I'm not sure if you're allowed visitors other than family yet."

"They don't trust me," Cato told her.

"They're working on it. Give it some time," Carrie said comfortingly.

"Where is she?" Cato asked suddenly.

For some reason, a flash of Aspen's face had gone through his head. Carrie's face fell slightly. "Let's not talk about that right now," she told him. Cato frowned at her. No one ever wanted to tell him anything about her. But he wanted to know. "How about you tell me how the paintings have been going? They look really good." Carrie's eyes scanned over the canvases littering the room. Her gaze settled on the one he was currently working on. "What's that one?"

"I don't know," Cato told her honestly.

He had no idea what most of the paintings in his room were actually about. He just drew random things until he couldn't think of anything else to draw. Most of them seemed to vaguely resemble people. But there were other things. Maybe memories of the Games or his life back in Two. He wasn't sure. Carrie and Cato stared at his latest painting. The picture was of a man and a woman laying on a bed together. It was drawn deliberately fuzzy. The only clear part of the picture was the blonde hair on both of the figures. Cato was immediately snapped back to another time in his life.

The two of them were laying in bed together. He and Aspen. He could remember that much. They were in bed on the train the morning that they arrived in District 5 for the Victory Tour. The memory wasn't like most of the ones that he had of her. This one was almost perfectly clear. Not shiny, like so many of his other memories of her were. Cato thought about the memory in confusion. He remembered the smiles on both of their faces. His sadness. Her love. Her support. She turned her gaze up to Cato and smiled gently. He stared down at her.

"How are you?" she asked him quietly.

Cato smiled sadly down at her. They both knew the answer to that one. "Thank you for coming in last night," he told her.

"You didn't leave me alone after we left District 11 because you knew that I needed someone. I know that you needed someone," she said. Cato nodded at her. "I like to think that I'm the one you need."

"You are. Always," Cato said, brushing the hair back off her forehead.

"We should probably go. Effie will want us to start getting ready for the ceremony," Aspen said tiredly.

"Just a little longer," Cato whispered.

Much to Cato's surprise, he wanted to keep watching the memory. Because he wasn't sure if it was real or not. Because he wanted to know. Aspen smiled in the memory as she rested back against his bare chest. His hands reached up to run through her blonde hair, pushing it back off her forehead. She tucked her head into his chest slightly. The tips of Cato's fingers gently trailed down her bare arms. She giggled quietly. Cato watched in amusement as the goosebumps rose against her skin.

"Finch wanted us to win together, you know," Aspen said, finally breaking the silence.

"Finch?" Cato asked.

"That was her name. The girl from Five," Aspen explained.

"I didn't know that..." Cato said guiltily.

"They'd probably prefer it that way. They don't want us to think of each other as anything but numbers," Aspen said, looking at the wall behind his head. "But we're not. We're all so much more than that."

Cato stared at her. "We are. I never thought about it before," he told her. Aspen raised a brow. "How much more we all were than just competitors in a game. Those are real lives. They really do end. And they leave this trail of... devastation behind."

"They do. But we live on, for the people who lost their lives to them. We don't just throw away a second chance," Aspen told him quietly.

"No. We don't," Cato agreed.

"Hey. Look at me," Aspen whispered.

Her voice barely sounded like hers. The voice that he remembered, at least. Her voice was so quiet and comforting right now. She gave him a slight smile as she got up and crawled into his lap. Cato stared at her as she boldly laid her legs on either side of his lap, holding one hand against his heart and the other against his cheek. She leaned into him and pressed a small kiss against his throat. Cato hummed pleasurably. His hands worked into her shirt and bunched it against her back. She smiled up at him.

His hands eventually released her shirt and worked up so that they could wind around the back of her neck. She smiled at him again as he pulled her in for a kiss. Something in his stomach lurched as he watched the memory. He had always loved those kisses he got with her. His arms wound tightly around her as her arms looped back around his neck. He smiled as she giggled softly against his mouth. His hands immediately worked their way up to thread themselves into her hair, using it as a grip. He wouldn't let her go. Not now and not ever.

Aspen let out a breathy moan as Cato grabbed her underneath her thighs, tightening his grip slightly. The edges of his short fingernails dug into her skin. A possessive nature fell over him as he kissed her. He had never felt that way about anyone. But that might have been because there had never been someone like her in his life before. His hands traveled to her shirt and gently began to work at it, removing it from her body. He knew that she wasn't there yet, but she didn't seem to be objecting to him. She even helped him shrug the shirt off, tossing it to the floor.

Cato released Aspen long enough to stare at her. She smiled as his eyes trailed over the lines of her body. Eventually, Cato grinned and gently pushed her back against the bed. She started laughing. She smiled again through the kiss as her hands worked against the bottom of his shirt. He helped her pull it off and tossed it to the ground with her own. A moment later he crawled on top of her, pushing her into the bed. He didn't know if she was really ready for this. But he didn't stop. She would stop him if things went wrong.

"Aspen! Cato!" Effie Trinket's voice called. The two of them sprang apart nervously, Cato almost throwing himself onto the floor. "We'll be arriving in District Five shortly. Please get ready!"

The fading sound of her clicking heels told them both that she had left. "I - I'm sorry," Aspen muttered breathlessly.

"No. No, I am," Cato told her desperately. He should have stopped it. "I should have -"

"You shouldn't have," Aspen interrupted. "I was..."

"Ready for it?" Cato asked her curiously.

"Well -"

"I'm teasing you," Cato interrupted, grinning at her.

"Don't do that," Aspen snapped.

"Sorry," Cato said, laughing at the scowl on her face. He pressed a small kiss against her temple as he pulled her down into the bed with him again. "It's all up to you. We can move as slow or as fast as you want. You tell me if you want to keep going or you want to stop. You tell me if you need time apart. They'll see what they want to see and order us to do what they want but... it doesn't have to be that way when it's just us. You deserve to be in control of this one part of your life. It's up to you."

Aspen looked shocked with what he'd said. "It's yours, too. What do you want?" Aspen asked him quietly.

"You. In any way I can have you," Cato said honestly.

"You have me. Now and always," Aspen said, laying up against his chest. He pressed a kiss into her hairline. She smiled up at him, gazing into his eyes. "This isn't the Cato I met in Remake."

Cato shook his head at her. He never wanted to be that man he had introduced himself as in Remake. He wanted to be this person that he was right now. "He was never real. He was just a persona. One that took on a life of its own. This is the real Cato," he told her, running his fingers down her arms. "He just had to find someone who helped, or forced, him to bring it out."

Aspen laughed sweetly. "I like this version of Cato," she told him.

"I do, too," Cato said.

They laid together in silence for a little while. Finally, she spoke again. "I want to." Cato's eyebrows rose in shock. She really wanted to sleep with him? Since when? "But I need some time," Aspen continued.

"Take all the time you need. I'm here when you're ready," Cato said.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Is this really what you wanted? Am I really what you wanted?" Aspen asked.

"You're what I never thought I would want. You're bull-headed and stubborn and annoying and a little tough to get emotion from sometimes," Cato told her. Aspen barked out a little laugh that Cato smiled at. "But I love you the way you are. I'd never want you to change. I mean, I'm one to talk about being bull-headed. We're both stubborn. You might not be the most emotional person in the world, but I know how to get it out of you. It's what makes those little moments worth it. You're not the kind of person I ever thought I would love. But you're what I know I need."

"You're right about that. I do need you," Aspen said.

Cato shook his head at her. "You don't need me."

It was her turn to shake her head. "No, I do," she said, wrapping her hand around the belt loops on his pants. He let out a deep breath. His hand went back to wrap around her small hip. "I don't know what I'd do without you."

"I don't know what you'd do without me, either. But I do know that this bed would be a lot lonelier," Cato said teasingly. Aspen laughed happily. "You wouldn't have someone to do... this..."

Aspen smiled at him again as Cato flattened his hand out against her lower stomach and gently pushed her back into the bed. Her laughter echoed around the room, making a smile tilt up on Cato's lips. Her giggles echoed around his mind as his lips traveled from her mouth to her throat and down to the top of her chest. His lips moved back up to her mouth as her legs wound in with his. He felt her shin hook around his calf. He smiled at her through the kiss. He had never loved someone the way that he loved her.

"Aspen! Cato!" Effie yelled into them. Cato groaned and drove his forehead into her chest, feeling it bounce slightly with her quiet laughter. "Are you ready?"

"Yes, we are," Cato called out to her.

Effie humphed her approval before leaving. Aspen looked back up at him and smiled. "I love you, Cato -"

"Cato?" Carrie's voice called. "Honey? You okay?"

Cato's head slowly turned toward her. He had been staring down at his bound hands for a long time. Carrie looked quite confused. He was confused too. How long was he in his own head for? Thinking about that life with Aspen. Was it real? Or was that a memory that had been implanted in his head? He didn't know what was real and what was just his imagination. He grit his teeth in annoyance and anger as he tried to figure out what kind of memory it was that he was just thinking about. It seemed so real, but she was a monster.

"Tell me about her," Cato told Carrie suddenly.

"What?" Carrie asked, baffled.

"Tell me about her," Cato repeated.

Carrie shook her head, gently laying her hand on his. "Oh, Cato, let's not talk about her right now. It's not important," she said carelessly.

"Carrie -"

"I'll tell you about her, Cato. I promise. But not right now," Carrie said. But he wanted to talk about her. He needed to know about her. "Let's just talk about something else for a while." Cato nodded blankly, knowing that this conversation wouldn't go any further with her. "Maybe not in here. The identical surroundings probably make you a little crazy. Let's do something. Do you want to get out for a little while?"

"No way they'll let me," Cato muttered.

"We have permission," Carrie told him. Cato raised a brow. They never let him leave the hospital. Not in months. "You can sit at the family table or you can sit with your friends. But... you'll have to get permission to sit wherever we go. Oh, and I don't think you can take the handcuffs off." Cato laughed humorlessly. "They're little steps, Cato. I'm proud of you. We all are. You're already looking and sounding much better."

"What friends?" Cato asked her.

"All of your friends, Cato," Carrie said quickly, empathy dripping from her tongue. "We'll all sit together. All of the family. Everyone else."

"Who else?" Cato asked tersely.

A bead of sweat broke out on her forehead. "She'll probably be there," Carrie finally admitted. Cato nodded at her. "If you're not ready, we can go another day."

Cato thought on that for a long time. He felt that familiar pull settle into his bones. Which way to go? It was like he was constantly caught in some type of internal battle with himself. What would he do? Sit with her. Try and be friendly with her. Hear her out. See if she really was a mutt like President Snow had shown him. Get to say everything that he had been holding back. Crane would probably be there. He could kill him. He could kill her. Cato's hands began clenching and clawing at his thighs maniacally as his pupils dilated.

"Cato?" Carrie's voice echoed, bringing him back to himself.

"What?" Cato asked, releasing the tension in his hands.

"You okay?" Carrie asked him.

Cato's eyes slowly began returning to their normal appearance. He saw Carrie's stance relax slightly. "Yeah. I'm fine. Could use some food and a real walk," Cato told her, getting to his feet.

Carrie smiled. "Alright. Let's go."

As the two of them walked out of the hospital room, Carrie smiled at Cato. He deliberately kept his hands out of her view. His hands clenched and released themselves angrily as he thought about seeing her again. He could kill her... He could hear her out... He didn't know. He remembered the woman who lied to him and loved Seneca Crane. But then he thought about the woman who sang to him on the rooftop of the Training Center. Which one was she? Cato shook his head and headed through the halls with Carrie. He didn't know who she was. Hell, he didn't even know who he was.

Aspen's P.O.V.

It turned out that Johanna and I were almost in good spirits when we went to the dining hall, where Gale and Katniss were waiting to eat with me. A few others were with them. Dean and Aidan smiled at me before walking off, likely to our table. They usually sat with us, even though the Hadley's had their own table. Pride was seeping off me in waves as I shook out my tired hands from firing the gun. Receiving a giant serving of beef stew didn't hurt my mood either. It was the first time I had seen real food since arriving in Thirteen that I hadn't hunted.

"First shipments of food arrived this morning. That's real beef, from District Ten," Greasy Sae told me as I stared down at it, bewildered. "Not any of your wild dog."

"Don't remember you turning it down," Gale tossed back.

Greasy Sae gave a slight scowl. "How's living with Johanna?" Katniss asked as we walked to the table.

"Not bad so far. She's a lot nicer here in Thirteen than she was in the Games. But it would have been a lot harder for her to be worse," I told her.

"It was kind of funny watching her during the Games," Gale said, chuckling softly.

"Oh, thanks," I snapped.

"We knew that she was secretly protecting you," Gale said.

"That doesn't make it better," I told him sharply. Gale opened his mouth to start talking about when I interrupted him. "How was your training?"

Katniss rolled her eyes. She had clearly enjoyed training much less than I had. "Tiring and annoying. I don't like listening to the others but I know that it's the only way to get out to the Capitol," she admitted.

"You only have to listen to their orders now. Once we're in the Capitol, we can get to it," I whispered to her.

"This is why they don't want you as a soldier," Gale pointed out.

"Right you are, my friend," I agreed.

While Katniss laughed, Gale scowled at me. But I wasn't in the mood to argue with him right now. We joined a group that included Delly, Annie, and Finnick. Most of Cato's family were there too, with the exception of Carrie and Marley. I assumed that she was taking care of her daughter right now. It was nice to see. It was something to see Finnick's transformation since his marriage. His earlier incarnations - the strangely helpful and secretive guardian angel in the first Games, the decadent Capitol heartthrob from before the Quell, the enigmatic ally in the arena, the broken young man who tried to help me hold it together - those had been replaced by someone who radiated life.

Finnick was the happiest person at the table and it showed in the way his personality reflected on the rest of us. His real charms of self-effacing humor and an easygoing nature were genuinely on display for the first time. He never let go of Annie's hand. Not when they walked and not when they ate. I doubted that he ever planned to. She was lost in some daze of happiness. There were still moments when you could tell that something slipped in her brain and another world blinded her to us. But a few words from Finnick called her back.

Delly, who I had known since I was little but never gave much thought to, had grown in my estimation. She was told what Cato said to me that night after the wedding, but she wasn't a gossip. Haymitch said that she was the best defender I had when Cato went off on some kind of tear about me. With Felix and Marcus permanently back in Two, there had to be a new neutral party to try and remind him of who I was. His own family tried to help, and they were apparently quite good at it, but they were only given a few rare chances to see him.

As it turned out, Delly spent a lot of time with Cato. More time than I had ever thought that she did. From what Haymitch said, Delly was always taking my side and blaming his negative perceptions on the Capitol's torture. Apparently, the two of them had become good friends since meeting each other a few months ago. He quite liked her. There was some moronic jealousy on my part, but I knew that she was just being helpful. She would never do that. Delly had more influence on him than any of the others did because he really did know her now.

Cato spent more time with her than anyone else as it had been so rare for his family to be allowed in to talk to her. Although, they were apparently letting his family see him more and more these days as he had calmed down significantly since first arriving in Thirteen. I tried to keep from getting too excited over that news since he still had a number of meltdowns about me. Anyway, even if Delly was sugarcoating my good points, I appreciated it. Frankly, I could use a little sugarcoating. A lot of it, actually.

Thankfully, since no one ever spoke about Cato to spare my feelings, I was able to focus on something else. Today, it was the first decent meal that I'd had in a long time. I was starving and the stew was so delicious - beef, potatoes, turnips, and onions in a thick gravy - that I had to force myself to slow down. I had a feeling that I would choke if I didn't stop eating. But it had been so long since I'd had real food that I couldn't stop myself. My full mouth kept me from speaking, but I did watch the others in the room a lot.

It was a nice sight. One that I hadn't seen in a long time. All around the dining hall, you could feel the rejuvenating effect that a good meal could bring on. The way it could make people kinder, funnier, more optimistic, and remind them it wasn't a mistake to go on living. There even seemed to be some color in the dull gray surroundings of Thirteen. It was better than any medicine. So I tried to make it last and join in the conversation. Sop up the gravy on my bread and nibble on it as I listened to Finnick telling some ridiculous story about a sea turtle swimming off with his hat.

Laugh at his stupidity before I realized that he was standing there. Directly across the table, behind the empty seat next to Johanna. Watching me. Carrie was standing at his side, smiling tensely. The entire dining hall went silent as they realized what was happening. The others at the table hadn't seen it yet. I choked momentarily as the gravy bread stuck in my throat. The conversations ceased as everyone leaned over to see if I was okay. I waved them off, trying to avoid the embarrassment of my reaction to seeing him out in the open.

"Are you alright, honey?" Alana asked me.

"Uh..." I gasped.

"Hey, Cato," Dean said suddenly.

All eyes jolted up to him. "Cato!" Delly chirped brightly. "It's so nice to see you out... and about."

No one was concerned about me anymore. I wiped the beading sweat off of my forehead and rubbed my sweaty palms together. Two large guards stood behind Cato. He was holding his tray awkwardly, balanced on his fingertips since his wrists were shackled with a short chain between them. That didn't make me any less nervous. I could see the look in his eyes. That look I had become so accustomed to seeing whenever he looked at me. Debating whether to kill me or not. Watching me with a mistrusting glare.

"What's with the fancy bracelets?" Johanna asked, breaking the long and awkward silence.

"I'm not quite trustworthy yet. I can't even sit here without your permission," Cato said.

There was some shame in my chest as I thought about how great it was that someone was keeping an eye on him. I knew that they were right. He wasn't trustworthy yet. He likely never would be. There were some sideways glances cast as me as Cato's gaze ran up and down the table. He indicated the guards with his head. I knew that everyone was waiting for me to answer and tell him whether or not he could sit here, but I couldn't. The words had gotten themselves stuck in my throat. Someone else spoke before I could.

"Sure he can sit here. We're old friends," Johanna said, patting the space beside her.

It was a good thing that she had said yes because there was a good chance that I would have said no. I swallowed thickly as Cato turned back to his guards. The guards gave me a cursory glance and I gave the slightest incline of my head. Maybe this would be a chance for me to show Cato that I wasn't the bad guy here. Maybe I could convince him that I didn't want to hurt him. That I never did. The guards nodded and Cato took a seat. The two guards didn't leave, although they did take a few steps back to give us some sense of normalcy.

"Cato and I had adjoining cells in the Capitol. We're very familiar with each other's screams," Johanna continued.

My head shot up. Cato looked as though he hadn't even heard her. Johanna was grinning at us. Annie, who was on Johanna's other side, did that thing where she covered her ears and exited reality. For a brief moment, I felt terrible for her. What life must have been like when you were consistently trapped inside your own head. At least my mind was still somewhat intact. Finnick shot Johanna an angry look as his arm encircled Annie. I wanted to say something to her, but I was too busy trying to pretend that Cato wasn't here.

"What?" Johanna asked him. "My head doctor says I'm not supposed to censor my thoughts. It's part of my therapy."

In a matter of seconds, the life had completely gone out of our little party. The world seemed to have a lot more of a grayish tint to it again. The rest of the dining hall seemed to be quieter. The food suddenly didn't taste quite as good as it had five minutes ago. Finnick murmured things to Annie until she slowly removed her hands. Then there was a long silence while people pretended to eat. No one spoke. No one looked at me or spoke to me. No one looked at Cato either. But I knew that they were waiting to see which one of us would make the first move.

It wouldn't be me. Even though I wished that it would be. I wanted to try and be the bigger person. I knew that I was being unfair, spending a long time trying to ignore the occasional looks that Cato would send me from the other side of the table. I tried to think of something conversational to say to him, but I couldn't. I was afraid of the response that I might get - no matter how simple the question was. Eventually, Cato's family began trying to integrate him into the conversation. But it was still tense. They were some of the only people who were speaking.

Cato responded to them mostly with short, clipped tones. But they were friendly enough. He was starting to sound a little more like himself but he definitely still sounded wrong. The emotion wasn't completely there. There was something wrong with his voice. Not to mention the simple fact that he looked so mistrusting. Even to his family members. I knew that he didn't always believe them. He thought that I had brought them onto my side, or some nonsense like that. Bitterness was the only way to keep me from being heartbroken.

Once or twice throughout the meal, I tried to meet Cato's eyes. Actually, I was trying to force myself to speak to him. I knew that it was the right thing to do. This was a great moment to try and make amends with him. But I couldn't. It was so much harder than I had ever expected it to be. I couldn't stand the look in his eyes. He looked like he was about to try and attack me. So, I tried to keep my head down at the table and focus on the food that I was actually enjoying for once. Rather, the food that I had been enjoying.

"Annie, did you know it was Cato who decorated your wedding cake?" Delly asked brightly, trying to finally break the awkward silence. "Back in Two, he started to learn to paint. It turned out that it carried over into decorating cakes."

Annie cautiously looked across Johanna. "Thank you, Cato. It was beautiful."

"My pleasure, Annie," Cato said.

My heart skipped a beat as my head snapped up to him. He was still looking at Annie. There was a softness in his eyes that I hadn't seen in a long time. He seemed to be missing that sharp edge that I usually saw in them. There was something about his voice right now, though. For just a brief moment, I had heard that old note of gentleness in his voice that I thought was gone forever. Not that it was directed at me. But still. Was there a chance that he might have slowly been coming back to himself?

"If we're going to fit in that walk, we better go," Finnick told her.

We all watched as he arranged both of their trays so he could carry them in one hand while holding tightly to her with the other. It was the way that Cato and I had once been. There was a little stab of bitterness and heartbreak that shot through my chest. Why could he look at everyone else the way that he had before but still not me? I knew why. I knew that almost all of the torture had been from memories of me but that didn't stop me from being hurt and bitter and directing it at the wrong person.

"Good seeing you, Cato," Finnick told him.

"You be nice to her, Finnick. Or I might try and take her away from you," Cato replied.

It almost could have been a joke - it was the kind of joke that Cato would have made before he had been taken by the Capitol - if the tone wasn't so cold. Everything it conveyed was wrong. The open distrust of Finnick (who he had always trusted), the implication that Cato had his eye on Annie, that Annie could desert Finnick, and that I did not even exist. His eyes hadn't once even flashed in my direction. My nerves stood on end as I looked at him. The rest of Cato's family were all looking in between the two of us.

"Oh, Cato," Finnick said lightly. "Don't make me sorry I restarted your heart."

Right now, even I was sorry that Finnick had restarted his heart - a thought that I was immediately horrified had crossed my mind. Finnick gave Cato a long stare and lead Annie away after giving me a concerned glance. I didn't hold his gaze for long. I didn't want to see the guilt in his eyes right now. Besides, I had a feeling that if I looked at Finnick and Annie any longer, I would start getting bitter that they were so happy and I was so miserable. Cato went back to his dinner as if nothing had happened.

When they were gone, Delly said in a reproachful voice, "He did save your life, Cato. More than once."

"For her," Cato said. He gave me a brief nod but didn't meet my eyes. "For the rebellion. Not for me. I don't owe him anything."

Cato never met my eyes. He didn't even look in my direction. I was definitely offended about the entire thing. He wouldn't even give me the briefest look. It was like I didn't even exist. He wasn't genuinely getting better. He clearly hated me just as much as he always had and now always would. The only difference was that now his hatred of me wasn't completely physical. He wasn't planning on strangling me. Right now, at least. I knew that I shouldn't rise to his bait, but I did.

"Maybe not. But Mags is dead and you're still here. That should count for something," I sneered at him.

"Yeah, a lot of things should count for something that don't seem to, Aspen," Cato growled, finally meeting my eyes. "I've got some memories I can't make sense of, and I don't think the Capitol touched them. A lot of nights on the train, for instance."

Again with the implications. That more happened on the train than did. That what did happen - those nights I only kept my sanity because his arms were around me - no longer mattered. The truth was, it did matter. Cato had helped me so much on that train. We had helped each other. But now he didn't care even the slightest bit about me. Or those nights on the train. Did he realize that he had genuinely helped me stay alive during the Victory Tour? Of course not. To him, everything I had done to and with him during those nights had been a lie, everything had been a way of misusing him.

While I was still steaming over his comments, it didn't seem that Cato had even realized just how much his words had affected me. The others at the table were still watching us closely. Cato barely seemed to notice. Maybe he did, but he just refused to make it known. A long time passed that I stabbed at my food angrily and the others just watched awkwardly. Eventually, Cato looked back up. He looked quite careless. Cato made a little gesture with his spoon, connecting Gale and me. I arched a brow.

"So, are you two officially a couple now, or are they still dragging out the star-crossed lover thing?"

My tongue lodged itself in my throat. "Still dragging," Johanna answered, knowing that no one else would speak.

"Enough, Cato," Alana snarled at her son.

It was the first time that I had ever heard her say something like that to her son. I'd never heard Alana speak like that. Particularly after what had happened to him in the Capitol. But I didn't need her to stick up for me. As a matter of fact, I was already prepared to react. Alana was still snapping at Cato to leave me alone and mind his manners but I had long since tuned out. I hated listening to him attack me. I knew that I should have just let it go - he didn't know any better - but I couldn't. I slammed my fist down into the table and everyone - even Cato - jumped in surprise. He turned a heated glare on me.

"There's not anything here," I snapped at him, motioning between myself and Gale.

"Get bored with him, then? Moved onto Crane?" Cato asked bemusedly.

Before I got the chance to react, Dean spoke over us. "Stop it. Or we'll take you back to the hospital. Leave her alone," Dean told his brother sharply.

At this point, the entire family was yelling at each other. Cato was just watching them carelessly. I rose from my seat at the dinner table to either punch him or cause some bodily injury, but neither one of us really got the chance to do anything to the other. In fact, Katniss grabbed me around the thigh and pulled me back into my seat at the table. Spasms caused Cato's hands to tighten into fists, then splayed out in a bizarre fashion. Was it all he could do to keep them from my neck? I could feel the tension in Gale's muscles next to me. For a moment, I feared an altercation.

But Gale simply said, "I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself."

"What's that?" Cato asked carelessly.

"You," Gale answered.

"You'll have to be a little more specific. What about me?" Cato asked, finally sounding interested.

"That they've replaced you with the evil-mutt version of yourself," Johanna said.

Gale finished his milk. "You done?" he asked me.

Too angry to speak, I rose in response and we crossed to drop off our trays. Katniss followed us. The rest of Cato's family watched us walk off sadly. At the door to the hallways that led to the compartments, an old man stopped me because I was still clutching the rest of my gravy bread in my hand. We weren't allowed to take food from the dining room. Something in my expression, or maybe the fact that I had made no attempt to conceal it, made him go easy on me. He let me stuff the bread in my mouth and move on.

The three of us were about to head back to the compartments when I heard footsteps falling behind us. I turned back curiously - and somewhat fearfully. Did he attack his guards so that he could meet me halfway and kill me? I jumped again when I realized that it really was Cato standing behind me. The two guards were close behind him. I immediately went to reach for an arrow, which obviously wasn't there. The shame instantly sank into my chest. I was angry with him and the situation, more than anything else, but I certainly wasn't going to kill him.

"Can I talk to you for a second?" Cato asked, barely looking at me.

Katniss and Gale were both giving him scrutinizing stares. They trusted him about as much as I did at the moment. I reached for Gale's shirt to keep him next to me. Embarrassingly enough, I was too afraid for him to walk away from us. I didn't want to be left alone with Cato. I was scared of him and what he would do to me. Not to mention, the law of averages showed that he was going to try and attack me again the moment that we were left alone. But, much to my surprise, Gale forced me to release him. He and Katniss did both give Cato a sharp glare as they walked past him.

"Watch yourself," Gale warned Cato quietly.

"They'd be on me in a second before I could touch her. Relax," Cato responded lightly. His gaze was on me. Not on Gale. "I'll leave your girlfriend alone."

There was something accusatory in his voice. I swallowed thickly. He really did think that the two of us were together now. "Go ahead. I'll be right there," I told Gale. He nodded at me and walked off. I turned back to Cato, trying to force a confident stare. "What's up?"

"Did we ever sleep together on the train?" Cato asked bluntly.

"What?" I asked, shocked by his statement.

"On the train when we were on our way to the Capitol at the end of the Victory Tour. Did we sleep together?" Cato clarified.

There was a conversation I hadn't been expecting. I swallowed again and stared at him, hoping that he might believe me this time. "We spent the nights in one of the rooms together most of the time. But we only spent those nights together. We just slept. That was it," I said as carefully as possible. Cato stared at me disbelievingly. "I mean, we kissed and some clothes were displaced but it was never anything... like that."

"When did we?" Cato asked curiously.

"The night that we got to the Capitol," I answered.

Cato grinned bitterly. "The night that you were with Seneca Crane."

I needed him to believe me. If he believed me, maybe there was a chance that we could fix all of this. "Cato -"

"Thank you," Cato interrupted coldly.

"That's it?" I asked him disbelievingly.

Cato stared at me. "What else do you want from me?"

"More than that," I answered.

"That makes two of us," Cato said.

My stomach jolted painfully. Did he want this to work out for us? I couldn't tell. Maybe he didn't know either. Sometimes I got the feeling that he might have really wanted to be with me. Other times I was sure that he still hated me. Maybe I was as confused about this entire thing as he was. The two of us stared at each other for a long time, not moving and not breaking eye contact. I wanted to tell him that I loved him and that I would always be here for him, but for some reason, I couldn't force any of those words out of my throat.

"I never betrayed you. Not purposely. You need to know that," I said quietly.

Cato shook his head at me. "I don't know anything about you, Aspen, "Cato said. I let out a deep breath. He knew everything about me. At least, there was once a time that he had known everything about me. "All I know is that I have so many memories of you and I have no idea which ones and real and which ones aren't."

"Which ones do you want to be real?" I asked him quietly.

"Do you have to ask?" Cato said.

"Yes, I do," I said disbelievingly.

At this point, I had no idea whether or not Cato actually wanted things with me to be real. He seemed to hate me. But wasn't there some hesitance in his angry gaze? Cato scoffed at me and rolled his eyes. I stared at him sadly for a moment. I went to speak to him again when the guards started pulling him away, insisting that he had been out long enough and had already made some real progress. He walked off with them without so much as a glance back in my direction. Katniss and Gale came up to my side. The three of us were almost to my compartment when Gale spoke again.

"I didn't expect that."

"I told you he hated me," I said.

"It's the way he hates you. It's so... familiar. I used to feel like that. When I'd watch you kissing him on the screen," Gale admitted.

"Gale," Katniss reprimanded him gently.

"That's what I needed to hear right now," I hissed irritably.

"I'm not finished," Gale said, shooting me a sympathetic stare. "Only I knew I wasn't being entirely fair. He can't see that."

We reached my door. "Maybe he just sees me as I really am. I have to get some sleep," I told him.

I'd had enough of talking about Cato for one day. Gale caught my arm before I could disappear. "So that's what you're thinking now?" he asked. I shrugged. "Aspen, as one of your oldest friends, believe me when I say he's not seeing you as you really are."

Gale kissed my cheek and went without another word. "Do you think he's being fair?" I asked Katniss.

She immediately shook her head. "No, Aspen, and I think that he knows that. I think it's driving him insane," Katniss told me. I nodded at her. She was right. Cato likely did know and his ever-battling mind was driving him insane. "Give him some time. Like we said before, it's only been a few months. This is something that could potentially take years to undo."

"I don't have years," I told her.

"Don't go there just yet. We're not in our graves," Katniss said, placing a hand on my shoulder.

"Look around, Cat. We've already got one foot in the ground," I said sadly.

"That's in your head and you know it," Katniss said.

"Maybe," I admitted.

She stared at me for a moment before giving me her arm. "Come here," Katniss whispered.

Begrudgingly, I walked into Katniss's open arms. She smiled slightly as I walked into them, allowing her to pull me in for a slight hug. The two of us stayed together for a long time before I finally became the first one to pull away. Katniss looked like she wished that I was still with her. But I just wanted to lay down and go to sleep for a year. We each gave each other a somewhat awkward smile before I turned and walked back into my own compartment and she returned to hers, Katniss making me briefly stop to promise that I would come back to her if I needed it.

The truth was, I probably always needed her help. This wasn't something that I could do on my own, although I seemed to always be doing it that way. I sat on my bed in my room, trying to stuff information from my Military Tactics books into my head while memories of my nights with Cato on the train distracted me. My eyes were scanning over the words but my brain was lost in the feeling of Cato's touch and soft laughter. After about twenty minutes, Johanna came in and threw herself across the foot of my bed. I finally looked up from my book.

"You missed the best part once you walked out of the hall. Delly lost her temper at Cato over how he treated you. She got very squeaky. It was like someone stabbing a mouse with a fork repeatedly. Alana and Damien tried to calm her down while Carrie and Dean shouted at each other over the way he was treating you," Johanna explained. I cringed slightly. I didn't want them fighting because of me. Enough people were already doing that. "Aidan looked like he was going to punch Cato. The whole dining hall was riveted."

"What did Cato do?" I asked.

"He started arguing with himself like he was two people. The guards had to take him away," Johanna explained. I nodded blankly. Haymitch had told me that he did that occasionally. "On the good side, no one seemed to notice I finished his stew."

Johanna rubbed her hand over her protruding belly. She had definitely put on a few pounds since returning to Thirteen. But her cheeks still had that dark, gaunt look about them. She wasn't sleeping well. I looked at the layer of grime underneath her fingernails and briefly wondered if the people in Seven ever bathed. But I knew they did. I had seen Johanna bathe in the arena. She had always seemed clean and well-groomed in the Capitol. Was this her own strange way of rebelling against them?

We spent a couple of hours quizzing each other on military terms. By the end, we could both answer every single question effortlessly and likely with more information than they would have asked for. I visited Ms. Everdeen, Katniss, and Prim for a while. I offered Johanna to come with me, but she insisted that she wanted to keep quizzing herself. My family all seemed to be doing alright. Like me, Katniss was excelling in training. Prim was still on track to becoming a doctor. Ms. Everdeen seemed happier than I had seen her in years.

When it was time to leave, I banged right into Seneca, who was reading a file as he returned to his own compartment. He stopped and looked at me. We didn't speak for a long time. Instead, we just remained locked in a hug for a long time. Undoubtedly, he had heard about the events in the cafeteria. I laid my head in his chest for a little while before leaning up and pressing a kiss against his cheek, squeezing his hand, and then turning to leave. Seneca watched me go, looking like he wanted to speak but remaining silent.

When I was back in my compartment, showered, staring into the darkness, I finally asked, "Johanna, could you really hear him screaming?"

"That was part of it. Like the Jabberjay's in the arena. Only it was real. And it didn't stop after an hour," Johanna said. "Tick, tock."

"Tick, tock," I whispered back.

Images of a screaming Cato filled my mind for the last few waking hours of the night. Suddenly those dreams of what the Capitol had been doing to him before we had rescued him resurfaced, this time seeming all the more real. Roses. Wolf mutts. Bear and lion mutts. Parents. Enemies. Tributes. Strangers. Frosted dolphins. Friends. Mockingjay's. Stylists. Me. Everything screamed in my dreams tonight.

Chapter 19: Author's Note

Hello, all!

It's occurred to me lately that I'm not very good about updating regularly. Actually, I've known that for a long time. Life gets in the way and sometimes motivation is impossible to find. So, I decided to create a Twitter account strictly for keeping you all up-to-date on when you can expect new updates to stories, what to expect, and hear out potential new ideas. If you would like to follow me, here is the link: twitter.com/walkerlifeforme

Feel free to reach out anytime with questions!

See you soon for the next update!

Love always,
A.

Chapter 20

With nothing else to do with my time and a newly-revived desire to get to the Capitol, I threw myself into training with a vengeance. I ate, lived and breathed the workouts, drills, weapons practices, and lectures on tactics. A handful of us were moved into an additional class that gave me hope I might have been a contender for the actual war. What I had initially thought would be another simple training exercise - perhaps just a little more in-depth - had turned out to be something much more.
The soldiers simply called it the Block, but the tattoo on my arm listed it as S.S.C., short for Simulated Street Combat. Deep in District Thirteen, they had built an artificial Capitol city block. The instructor broke us into squads of eight as we attempted to carry out missions - gaining a position, destroying a target, or searching a home - as if we were really fighting our way through the Capitol. The problem was that the Block was rigged so that everything that could go wrong for you did. It was a worst-case scenario type of drill.
A false step triggered a land mine, a sniper appeared on a rooftop, your gun jammed, a crying child lead you into an ambush, your squadron leader - who was just a voice on the program - got hit by a mortar and you were forced to figure out what to do without orders. Part of me knew it was fake and that they weren't going to kill me. If you set off a land mine, you heard the explosion and had to pretend to fall over dead. But in other ways, it felt pretty real in there - the enemy soldiers dressed in Peacekeepers' uniforms and the confusion of a smoke bomb. They even gassed us.
It was one of the worst moments we'd had in the Block. Johanna and I were the only ones in our team who got our masks on in time. The rest of our squad were knocked out for ten minutes. And the supposedly harmless gas I took a few lungfuls of gave me a wicked headache for the rest of the day. Whatever was in the gas wasn't toxic but it certainly wasn't pleasant either. I supposed that it was only a fraction of what we would feel if we were gassed and too slow in the middle of a battle in the Capitol.
Cressida and her crew taped Johanna and me on the firing range. I knew that Gale, Katniss, and Finnick were being filmed as well. They had each mentioned to me that the filming was moving through the ranks of people in Thirteen. It was part of a new propos series to show the rebels preparing for the Capitol invasion. Cressida told us that the series had been quite popular in the Capitol. On the whole, things were going pretty well.
The good thing with training was that it kept me busy almost all of the time. It was a lot more practice time than I had ever gotten. I was a more talented fighter than I had ever been before. Both with the bow and the gun. I had gotten a lot of time to work on my physicality too. If we were going to wind up in the Capitol, I knew that I would be dealing with human fighters and mutts. I had been fighting with Thirteen's soldiers for practice almost every day. I had become good enough to keep toe-to-toe with some of their best fighters.
All was going well until Cato started showing up for our morning workouts. All eyes had turned to me when he'd first entered. Other than stumbling away from him, I'd remained stone-faced. The manacles were off of his wrists, but he was still constantly accompanied by a pair of guards. After lunch one day, I saw him across the field drilling with a group of beginners. I didn't know what they were thinking. If a spat with Delly and his family could reduce him to arguing with himself, he had no business learning how to assemble a gun.
Unfortunately, I was all too aware that Cato spent almost half of his time in training watching me. Everyone knew it. He didn't keep it a secret. I tried to focus on my training but I knew that I was losing my stability in training. I suddenly began having problems hitting my targets and landing on my marks. It took a few snaps from Dean to get me back to my former mindset. He had given me a not-so-friendly reminder that people would always try using Cato against me. He was right. I had to be prepared for it.
When I finally got around to confronting Plutarch, he assured me that it was all for the camera. There were no bullets in the gun he was using and he never would have them. They had gotten footage of Finnick and Annie getting married and Johanna hitting targets, but all of Panem was wondering about Cato. They needed to see he was fighting for the rebels, not for Snow. And maybe if they could just get a couple of shots of the two of us, not kissing necessarily, just looking happy to be back together -
I walked away from the conversation right then. That was not going to happen. I wasn't stupid enough to think that Cato would ever be okay with talking to me again. I knew that he wasn't okay with me. He barely managed to hold it together whenever we were in the same room. People would just think that we were taking time to focus on the war rather than each other. Just to try and be somewhat helpful I had suggested to Plutarch to try inter-cutting footage or use some fancy editing techniques to make it look like we were laughing or talking to each other.
He had taken me up on that offer. There was now a popular clip of us in what appeared to be a brief - albeit friendly - conversation. It had been shot from a perspective that was too far away to hear though Plutarch had managed to make it look sweet enough. We were supposedly standing within inches of each other. I was smiling at something he was saying (though it was really a comment from Finnick I was laughing at) while he looked at me lovingly. They had cut out his face from an old video and put it on his body in the new video, editing him closer to me.
It was one clip I couldn't watch. I walked away every time I saw it. I hated to admit to anyone that I was afraid of him. I was terrified that he might have lost his mind at any moment and try to kill me. I saw the vague white-knuckled grip he had now and again when he looked over at me. I saw the look in his eyes. The desire to see me with blood pouring out of my slit throat. I could tell he didn't like seeing me with a weapon, just the way I didn't like seeing him with a weapon. It made us both nervous.
In my rare moments of downtime, I anxiously watched the preparations for the invasions. Each time I would see equipment and provisions being readied as the divisions were assembled. You could tell when someone had received orders because they were all given a very short haircut, the mark of a person going into battle. It became a little difficult to tell people apart after a while. There was much talk of the opening offensive, which would be to secure the train tunnels that fed up into the Capitol.
Just a few days before the first set of troops were set to move out, York unexpectedly told Johanna and me that she had recommended us for the exam and we were to report immediately. We stared at each other for a brief moment before setting off through the building at a sprint without even thinking to thank York. There were four parts of the exam: an obstacle course that assessed your physical condition, a written tactics exam, a test of weapons proficiency, and a simulated combat situation in the Block.
We had barely gathered our ground before we were sent to the beginning of the exam. I didn't even have time to get nervous for the first three. I did well on them all. The obstacle course reminded me of the Gauntlet that had been designed for the Tributes to use during training before the Hunger Games. I'd had one of the fastest times. The written tactics exam and weapons proficiency tests were both standards from what we had been doing for training lately. Johanna and I both passed the second and third tests with flying colors.
Despite being prepared for the fourth test, there was a backlog at the Block. It appeared to be some kind of technical bug that they were working out. A group of us exchanged the information that we knew. Most of what I'd already known seemed to be true. You were forced to go through alone during this test. There was no predicting what situation you would be thrown into. One boy said, under his breath, that he had heard it was designed to target each individual's weaknesses. It sounded accurate and eerily similar to something the Capitol would have done.
It made sense as that was exactly where we were attempting to go. His comment remained stuck in my head for a long time. My weaknesses? That was a door I didn't even want to open. But I found a quiet spot and tried to assess what they might have been. The length of the list depressed me. Lack of physical brute force. A bare minimum of training. And somehow my stand-out status as the Mockingjay didn't seem to be an advantage in a situation where they were trying to get us to blend into a pack. They could have nailed me to the wall on any number of things.
Plenty of things could be used as my weakness. Something simple like snakes, maybe? That seemed unlikely. It was too simple. I knew only one thing that even District Thirteen knew was my weakness. Cato. I feared having to see him in some capacity during the training. I knew that it wouldn't be fair to use Cato against me, but it was very likely that someone would attack me with him. I tried to imagine that it would be something else. Anything else. The problem was that I wasn't sure what weakness I had that I would be able to overcome.
"Aspen," a voice greeted.
I looked up from my lap to see Dean Hadley next to me. "Hi," I greeted simply.
"Came to wish you luck," Dean said, resting a hand on my lap.
"Thanks."
"Nervous?"
"A little," I admitted, rolling my eyes at myself. "Which seems stupid, considering that I've been in the Hunger Games twice. I know what real nerves are. But, for some reason, I'm terrified right now. More than I ever have been."
Even with two trips to the Hunger Games under my belt, this was one of the most frightening things I had ever experienced. "Perhaps it's because you know that they'll use your weaknesses against you. In your first Games, they didn't know what those were yet. In your second, you were already resigned to death. But this time you've got something serious to lose," Dean said reasonably. I stared at him, wondering what exactly he was referencing. "You need to get to the Capitol and this is your one way."
"You don't sound too thrilled with my choice," I commented.
Dean stared at me for a moment before shaking his head. "You're my brother's wife," he pointed out. I twitched slightly but remained otherwise silent. "Whether or not he remembers it right now, he loves you. He doesn't want to see anything happen to you."
"Before I would have said that you're right. Now I think he'll just be upset that it's not him," I mumbled.
Dean shook his head. "You don't believe that."
"I do," I replied.
We sat in silence for a while as I stared down at my lap. "Aspen," Dean called, shattering the silence. "Do you want to talk about it?"
The last thing I wanted to do was talk about it. The idea of talking about it made my stomach churn. "No. I hate that everyone keeps fucking asking me about it," I sneered, feeling my throat tighten with the threat of tears. Any mention of it turned me into a sobbing mess. "I don't want to talk about it. I don't ever want to talk about it. I just want to pretend like it never happened."
"That one particular thing or the relationship in its entirety?" Dean asked.
Forgetting the whole relationship was a devastating thought. He was the love of my life. "Selfishly? Just him being taken by the Capitol. Selflessly? Everything. I want us to have never met. I want him to have become a Victor. Have his home in Victor's Village with his family who loved him. I want them to have never experienced pain. I want them to have never felt a loss. I want him to have gotten a chance to marry Skye or Julie. Have a real life with them. Let the name Aspen Antaeus just be a passing whisper in the wind."
"You want that?" Dean asked, sounding shocked.
The thought of him having never known me was surprisingly painful. I wanted him in my life. I wanted to have him for the rest of my life, but it wasn't right to keep hanging onto him when all I did was bring pain. "I don't know," I admitted. "I don't know what I want."
"I think you do," Dean said.
"What's the point of thinking about what I want, Dean?" I snapped. No matter what I wanted, it was never going to work out. "I think it's pretty obvious by now that I'm not going to get what I want."
"So, why are you here?" Dean asked.
"Because I don't know what else to do," I said honestly. I couldn't walk to the Capitol to assassinate Snow. This was the best way to get where I needed to go. "I have to spend my time doing something and I think this is the best way. At least here I'm working toward something. Not necessarily something I want but something I need."
Dean and I exchanged a long look, neither one of us able to process out loud what we were both thinking. "You don't have to do this, you know. You can stay here and wait for the war to be over. You've fought enough," Dean whispered.
Staying here would have been worse than going to the Capitol, which was sure to be a nightmare. "I can't stay here with him. Not like this," I answered, feeling my throat tighten with nerves.
"I understand," Dean said, nodding.
Would we be together? Dean being along on my trip to the Capitol would have made my mission much more complicated. "What about you? Are you planning on going?" I asked him. Dean remained silent. "Of course you are. How does Carrie feel about that?"
Carrie was one of the sweetest members of the family and deserved much better than to wait with bated breath to see if her husband would return to her. "She's not thrilled, but she knows I need to do this. Just like you do," Dean said. We nodded at each other. "Should I give you a few minutes to prepare?"
"Yeah," I said, not wanting to think about Cato any longer. "Thanks."
"Best of luck," Dean said.
He had to be kidding. I doubted that Dean wanted me to succeed in the Block. He would have been perfectly happy with me screwing up and being stuck in Thirteen for the rest of the war. Johanna was eventually called three ahead of me and I gave her a nod of encouragement as she walked off. I wished I had been at the top of the list because by now I was overthinking the whole thing, planning out every possibility of the exam in my head. By the time my name was called, I didn't know what my strategy should have been.
Fortunately, once I was in the Block, a certain amount of training did kick in. As I had initially expected, it was an ambush situation. Peacekeepers appeared almost instantly and I had to make my way to a rendezvous point to meet up with my scattered squad. Most of the exam was pretty standard as I slowly navigated the street, taking out Peacekeepers as I went. Two were on the rooftop to my left and another was in the doorway up ahead. It was challenging, but not as hard as I was expecting.
There was a nagging feeling that if it was too simple, I must have been missing the point. The Block was designed to catch us with our weaknesses. So far I had no idea what they were using against me. This was everything I had been training for. There was nothing here that was a genuine weakness except for a brief sprint over two blocks. I was within a couple of buildings from my goal when things began to heat up. A half dozen Peacekeepers came charging around the corner. They were sure to outgun me, but I noticed something.
There was a drum of gasoline lying carelessly in the gutter. Staring at the drum I realized what Thirteen was planning on testing me with. This was it. I was positive that this was my test. I was supposed to perceive that blowing up the drum would be the only way to achieve my mission. Would I have noticed that tiny detail in actual combat? Just as I stepped out to do it, my squadron leader, who had been fairly useless up to this point, quietly ordered me to hit the ground.
Every instinct I had screamed for me to ignore the voice, to pull the trigger, and to blow the Peacekeepers sky-high. I had the same urge now that I did when I'd blown up the Careers' supplies two years ago. But Haymitch had been furious with me and it had resulted in me deafening myself. Suddenly, I realized what the military would think my biggest weakness was. From my first moment in the Games, when I ran for that orange backpack, to the firefight in Eight, to my impulsive race across the square in Two. I couldn't take orders.
Blowing up that gas tank would have been a trap. It would have killed me. I smacked into the ground so hard and fast, I would be picking gravel out of my chin for a week. Someone else not far behind me blew the gas tank. The Peacekeepers died instantaneously. I made my rendezvous point. I was so stunned at the realization that I had succeeded that I hadn't even realized when the exam was over. One of the soldiers had to come in and tell me that I had completed the task.
The soldiers outside looked like they had gotten their first laugh in a long time at the sight of me practically skipping along the path. A huge part of me wanted to go to Command and rub my new status in Coin's face but the more mature part of me followed the order of the test proctor to head to the waiting soldiers. When I exited the Block on the far side, a soldier congratulated me, stamped my hand with squad number four-five-one, and told me to report to Command.
I was sprinting so fast to Command that I ran directly into Katniss. "Whoa," she gasped, grabbing my arms to steady me. "You look happy."
"I made it," I chirped.
Katniss's eyes brightened. "Number?"
"Four-five-one," I said, showing her my arm.
"Me too," Katniss said, showing me her identical stamp. "I'm on my way to Command now."
We spent a few seconds staring at the numbers stamped on our arms in disbelief. "I can't believe we made it this far. I thought they were going to tell me no," I told her.
"I think they know you'd have gone anyway," Katniss said, chuckling.
"That's true."
"You look happy."
How happy could one person be when their happiness came from excitement over the potential to assassinate someone? "I'm happy that I'll finally get the chance to do something other than just sitting here and hating myself," I explained. "Happy, in general? That's another story."
"He could still -"
"Don't," I interrupted Katniss. I couldn't hear about Cato anymore if we had no chance of making things work. "Please don't. I can't keep thinking about him. I just want to forget."
"Forget everything that's happened over the last year-and-a-half including all the good times?" Katniss asked.
"With the good times come the bad."
"We'll have good times again. All of us."
There were no more good times for me. The only good times that were left for us was if we were all far away from each other. We couldn't be together. Cato hated me and I loved him. That was hard enough. We couldn't work back toward being the way we were. He would try to kill me. We didn't belong together anymore. It was the reason I no longer wore my wedding ring. It was time to move forward, as much as it genuinely broke my heart. I realized too late that my eyes were watering.
I hated people seeing me like this. "Are you okay?" Katniss asked, laying a hand on my shoulder.
Okay? I wasn't even close to being okay. I hadn't been close to being okay in years. "I just miss him, Cat," I admitted, hearing the whine in my voice. "He's right here, but I miss him so much."
Katniss nodded. "I understand. He's not the guy you married."
"No."
"Do you think he could be?" Katniss asked.
It was a strange question that I couldn't be sure of. Did I think he could ever be the man I married? I wasn't sure. I so desperately wanted to believe that Cato could turn back into the man I had once fallen in love with. The Career who had loved to mess with me. The Victor who was determined to keep our long-distance relationship alive. My husband who would have done anything to keep his wife alive. The father to my deceased child. My eyes watered again as I thought back to a day that had always been lovely in my memory.
"Hey," I greeted, sitting down to answer Cato's call.
It was one of the rare moments I got to speak to him during our times in our home Districts. "It's good to hear you speak," Cato's voice called back as I folded my legs underneath myself in my chair.
"You too," I chirped, twirling the phone cord in between my fingers. "God, I've missed your voice."
"What's wrong?" Cato asked worriedly, hearing the desperation in my voice.
"What?" I asked, surprised that he had caught it so easily. "Nothing. I'm just - I'm really happy to hear from you. I had a nightmare the other night but that doesn't matter."
"What was it about?" Cato asked.
The same thing that they were always about. The very real fear that I could have possibly lost him one day. "It's not important," I said truthfully. I wanted to talk about the hope that we could have in life, not the potential horrors. "I don't want to spend our few minutes together talking about that. I want to talk about you. Tell me what's been going on back at your house."
Cato chuckled under his breath. "What hasn't been going on?" he asked. I laughed softly. That was fair. It didn't seem like either one of us had had any low-key days since we'd become Victors. "Everything. Carrie is constantly talking about the wedding. I think she's ready to fight the Capitol to plan it."
I let out a loud laugh without meaning to. "She's that excited?" I asked.
It was nice to know that Cato's family liked me as much as I had been hoping they would. I'd honestly thought his family would despise me when we'd first met. "She's more than excited. I don't think she ever thought I would get married," Cato said.
It didn't sound accusatory but I couldn't help myself when I said, "Sorry."
"Don't be sorry," Cato said quickly. "It's going to be the best day of my life."
My wedding day. A day I'd never thought would come. "Yeah. Mine too," I muttered happily.
The Capitol would plan ninety-nine percent of the day but there was one thing they couldn't control; the love between the two of us. That was all between us. "You should hear the way my mom talks about the wedding. I think she could care less about what I look like," Cato said, laughing under his breath. I smiled at the thought. His mother had always struck me as the type who wanted to see her son wind up with the perfect girl. Was I that girl? "She's always wanted more girls in the house. She was thrilled when Carrie and Dean got married."
She seemed like one of the loveliest people I'd ever met, even if that meeting had only been brief. "I've only seen your mom a few times but she's been so kind to me. I'm happy she wants me around," I said honestly.
"We all do," Cato said quietly.
All of them seemed like a bit of a stretch. I wasn't sure that Damien and Aidan wanted me around. "My family's warming up to the idea that we're getting married," I said, though it wasn't completely true.
It was more that they were leaving me alone about my relationship. "Yeah?" Cato asked disbelievingly.
He was always one to call me out when he knew I wasn't telling him the complete truth. "They know that I'm happy with you. They know that I'm happier than I've ever been and that's what matters to them," I said. Although Cato was silent, I knew that there was a smile on his face. "I think they're finally starting to believe me when I tell them that the cameras only caught a small part of our relationship."
"I hope I get the chance to meet them before the wedding," Cato said.
That was all I wanted right now. I wanted him to get the chance to sit down with my family and for them all to realize that we were right together. The cameras hadn't done us justice. "I do, too, but the Capitol wants us and our families as far away from each other as we can get," I told Cato. "At least, until they move me to District 2."
"They're making you move here?" Cato asked disbelievingly.
"Yeah," I answered bluntly, having forgotten that Snow hadn't told Cato about my eventual move. "Snow told me."
"Oh, Aspen... I'm so sorry," Cato said quietly.
All that mattered was that we were together and I could ensure my family's safety. "It's okay. If it keeps my family and friends safe, I don't care. The only thing I'm worried about is that they won't be able to live off my Victor winnings any more," I said truthfully. Katniss and Gale would be able to readjust with ease. Ms. Everdeen and Prim would be another story. "Katniss and Gale are going to have to rely on hunting again. Prim's gotten so used to living in that Victor's Village house."
"They won't starve. We'll make sure of it," Cato promised.
"How? I'll be hundreds of miles away from them," I said sadly.
It wasn't fair for me to be so far away from my family and unable to keep them safe. "Maybe you can work something out with Haymitch to have him look after them? Or, maybe make a deal with Crane? He seems willing to help you," Cato offered.
I swallowed nervously at the thought of asking Seneca Crane for any favor. "That's an idea."
Cato sensed my hesitance to say anything to Seneca and instead changed the subject. "We'll both help them out. We have more than enough money. My family doesn't need it all," Cato said. I smiled at his selflessness. "Once we get married and move into my house in Victor's Village I'm sure it won't be long before they want my family out of there."
"At least you'll have them close," I muttered.
The bitterness in my voice was a little more obvious than I had intended it to be. "Maybe we can talk things out with the people in the Capitol and have them come to Two with you? Or split our time between Two and Twelve?" Cato offered.
"You would do that?" I asked, shocked.
He was willing to be away from his family for half of the year? "Aspen, I would do anything for you."
"Even move away from your family for half the year?"
"If it means you could be with yours, of course."
"What did I do to deserve you?"
"That should be the other way around," Cato said, the smile evident in his voice.
Suddenly, Alana's voice came over the receiver. "If you think I'm letting you back in there -"
"It was an accident!" Aidan responded.
"There are char marks on the stove!" Dean yelled.
"That I had to clean for an hour!" Carrie shouted.
The voices continued for a few seconds before I muttered, "Umm... What's going on there?"
"Oh, Aidan blew up a pot of rice the other day," Cato explained.
I barked out a hysterical laugh. "What?"
It sounded like there had been an exciting last few days at the Hadley household. "Well, he knows that I've been trying to help my mom out in the kitchen. There's a lot of people in the house for just one person to be doing all the cooking," Cato explained. I smiled at his sweet gesture toward his mother. It was nice to know that he was trying to do something good in the family. "Aidan decided that he would try and help me do the side dishes like the rice. He put it in the cooker for about five minutes too long."
Throughout Cato's story, I had continued chuckling. "That's a good one. I'm not the best cook but even I've never done that before," I said. It took true skill in the kitchen to blow up a pot of rice. "Maybe I'll teach him how to make Greasy Sae's winter specialty."
"I thought you loved me?" Cato asked playfully.
"I do, which is exactly why I like to mess with you," I teased.
"Ah... you like messing with me?" Cato asked, a dangerous edge in his voice.
It told me that I was about to regret teasing him. "Why do I feel like this is about to backfire on me?" I groaned.
Cato chuckled under his breath. "You think I'm evil," he teased. We both chuckled as I heard the door to the office in his house click closed. "Do you want to hear about my dream the other night?"
"What was it?" I asked curiously.
Cato's voice lowered to a gentle purr. "We were back in the Tribute Center that night at the end of the Victory Tour," Cato began. My face lit up with embarrassment. I still couldn't think about that night without feeling a little stupid. "But our night didn't end there. When the morning came, I locked the door so no one could come in. Seeing you in bed like that, there's nothing better." The blush spread from my cheeks down my chest at the confidence in his voice. "Those sheets didn't stay on you long. But I did."
"Oh, yeah?" I asked, trying to keep the nerves out of my voice. Cato hummed quietly on the other end. "Something to look forward to when we see each other again."
"I'll be counting down the minutes," Cato replied.
"You know when we get to the Capitol, I'm not letting you leave my room," I told him.
"You know we have a job to do, right?" Cato chuckled.
"Would you rather me do my job or you?" I teased.
Cato chuckled as a familiar voice came from behind me. "Aspen?"
"Oh, god!" I gasped.
Ms. Everdeen had startled me so much that I dropped the phone as I whirled around to face her. She was standing in the doorway wearing an amused look on her face. "Sorry, honey," Ms. Everdeen said, clearly fighting back a laugh as I scrambled to pick up the phone. "We're ready for dinner."
"No, it's fine. I'll be out there in a few minutes," I stammered, holding my hand over the receiver. Ms. Everdeen smiled and nodded as she turned to leave. "Mom?" She stopped and turned back to me. "Did you hear any of that?"
She merely smiled. "I didn't hear anything you didn't want me to hear."
A breath of relief escaped me. "Thanks, Mom."
"Wrap it up," Ms. Everdeen said gently.
"Okay," I said, removing my hand from over the receiver. Cato was laughing as Ms. Everdeen turned to leave again, this time closing the door behind her. "I swear, you knew that was going to happen," I growled at Cato.
"I've just got good timing," Cato said, still laughing.
"Somehow, that was your fault," I moaned.
"You were the one bringing it up."
"You started it!"
"And I’ll finish it when I see you again," Cato growled.
The blush returned full-force. "Why does your mother never hear you say things like that?" I whined.
"Because I can hear a door opening behind me," Cato teased. I rolled my eyes. "And, uh, she’s seen far worse than she’s heard."
I had to fight the slight bitterness that crept into my mind. I had to remember that Cato had lived a privileged and carefree life before me. "Right," I said blankly.
"She hated them all. But she loves you," Cato said, trying to reinforce the point that I meant more than any of his prior flings. "So do I. You mean what none of them ever could."
"I hate the Games, but I’m so glad I met you," I told him truthfully.
"Even when I’m being an asshole?" Cato teased.
At least he hadn't taken my many insults to heart. I smiled at his teasing tone. "You're always an asshole, but that doesn't change how much I love you. I guess I'm kind of an asshole too so it works out," I said, laughing.
Cato laughed loudly. "You did drop a nest of Tracker Jackers on me."
"You tried to kill me!"
"Me? I would never," Cato said haughtily. We both laughed. "Maybe seduce you."
We laughed again. "You would succeed."
"Trust me, I always knew that."
"Asshole," I growled.
He was right though. He had always been able to see the way he'd affected me, even long before I'd realized what he was doing to me. "Calling your future husband an asshole? That's rude," Cato teased.
"Not even marrying you will stop me from calling you that," I said truthfully.
"Aspen! Dinner!" Ms. Everdeen called from the other room.
"Sorry! Be right there!" I shouted.
"Sounds like you should go," Cato said.
"I should, I just don’t want to," I breathed.
Cato chuckled under his breath. "I'll call you in a few days."
"Okay. I love you."
"I love you too. More than you know."
More than I deserved, at least. I smiled into the phone, twirling the cord again. "Don't let Aidan burn down the house."
"Don't forget you make noises in your sleep," Cato replied.
"What?" I snapped, sitting bolt upright in the chair.
"Enjoy dinner!" Cato yelled.
He hung up the phone before I got the chance to respond. I wanted to know what kind of noises I made or if he was even telling me the truth. I rolled my eyes and placed the phone down on the receiver. "Asshole," I growled through a smile.
"What are you smiling about?" Katniss asked, bringing me back to reality.
"Funny memory," I muttered, wishing I could remain in one of those happy memories instead of my horrible present or bleak future. "I guess if I can't have him back, I want to at least remember the good times because there were a lot of them."
"That's a good idea, Aspen. I'd like to hear about them one day, if you're okay with talking about them," Katniss prompted gently.
One day I would tell her about Cato. Maybe just enough just before I died so that someone knew what he was once like. "Not yet. But I think I'll get there."
"I understand. You know you can talk to me about anything, right?"
"I know," I said, easily picking up what she was talking about. The one thing I couldn't talk to anyone about. I couldn't even think about it myself. "I can't talk to anyone about that. The one person I would have talked to about it isn't an option anymore."
All he would do was scream at me for my actions. "Well, if you ever decide you need to talk, I'm always here," Katniss said reassuringly.
"Thanks," I said, grabbing her arm and tugging her along. "Come on. They'll be furious if we don't report for duty after we made such a fuss about it."
Trying to forget about our prior conversation, now almost giddy with success, Katniss and I ran through the halls, skidding around corners and bounding down the steps because the elevator was too slow. I banged into the room with Katniss on my heels before the oddity of the situation dawned on me. We shouldn't have been in Command; we should have been getting our hair buzzed. The people around the table weren't freshly minted soldiers but the ones calling the shots.
I leaned over to Katniss with a lowered voice. "Why didn't we get our hair cut?" I asked her.
Katniss shrugged. "I don't know."
"Would it be shallow of me to say I'm glad I didn't?" I asked.
Katniss laughed. "Yes."
Boggs smiled at my comment and shook his head when he saw us. "Let's see it." Unsure now, I held out my stamped hand. Katniss followed the action a moment later. "You're both with me. It's a special unit of sharpshooters."
"Sweet," I chirped happily.
Putting an arrow through Snow's eye socket might have made me feel a little bit better. "Join your squad," Boggs commanded.
For a moment I believed that maybe we would be alone. Special soldiers that no one had ever seen around for their protection. Boggs nodded over at a group lining the wall. Gale. Finnick. Dean. Now Katniss. Five others I didn't know. My squad. It looked like there were still a few spots open for others to join. I wasn't only in, I would get to work under Boggs with my friends. Some form of comfort during the war. I forced myself to take calm, soldierly steps to join them, instead of jumping up and down.
Katniss and I took our slow steps over to the wall. "They let you in here?" Gale asked me.
"You think you're that much better than me?" I snapped teasingly. His brow rose curiously. "What?"
Why did he look like he was expecting me to grow a second head? "Nothing," Gale said, shaking his head. "For a second you just sounded like you did before the Games."
Because I'd thought about a memory of when I was that girl. When Cato was himself. "It comes and goes," I said simply.
"I hope it stays. I missed that smile," Gale teased, grabbing my chin and shaking it.
"Me too," I said, pulling out of his grip.
As I looked around I realized that we must have been important, because we were in Command and it had nothing to do with a certain Mockingjay. Plutarch stood over a wide, flat panel in the center of the table. He was in the middle of explaining something about the nature of what we would encounter in the Capitol. I was thinking that this was a terrible presentation - because even on tiptoe I couldn't see what was on the panel - until he hit a button. A holographic image of a block of the Capitol projected into the air.
"This, for example, is the area surrounding one of the Peacekeepers' barracks. Not unimportant, but not the most crucial of targets, and yet look." Plutarch entered some sort of code on a keyboard, and lights began to flash. They were in an assortment of colors and blinked at different speeds. "Each light is called a pod. It represents a different obstacle, the nature of which could be anything from a bomb to a band of mutts. Make no mistake, whatever it contains is designed to either trap or kill you. Some have been in place since the Dark Days, others developed over the years. To be honest, I created a fair number myself. This program, which one of our people absconded with when we left the Capitol, is our most recent information. They don't know we have it. But even so, it's likely that new pods have been activated in the last few months. This is what you will face."
A set of deadly traps that were hidden in plain sight... It sounded far too familiar. I was unaware that my feet were moving to the table until I was inches from the holograph. Cannons containing fireballs strong enough to blast someone to pieces. A tsunami ready to wipe out dozens of players. A nest of deadly insects. An underground door ready to release the deadliest of mutts. My hand reached into the display and cupped a rapidly blinking green light. It was a Capitol trap at its finest.
Someone joined me, his body tense. Finnick, of course. Because only a Victor would see what I saw so immediately. The arena. Laced with pods controlled by Gamemakers. I turned back for a moment to see Seneca standing at the doorway. He nodded as I released the pod. He knew what Finnick and I already knew. The battle in the Capitol would be a massive version of the most intense Hunger Games ever created. Finnick's fingers caressed a steady red glow over a doorway.
"Ladies and gentlemen..."
Finnick's voice was quiet, but mine rang through the room. "Let the Seventy-Sixth Hunger Games begin!"
"What?" Katniss asked, walking up to my other side.
I kept my voice low, knowing that we couldn't let the others overhear us. "This is how arenas are designed," I whispered to her. I raised my hand, pointing to Snow's mansion in the center of the map. "The Cornucopia." My hand moved to the wide circle of the Capitol surrounding it. "The arena." I honed in on one of the blinking lights near the palace. "Traps designed for the Tributes at random, some protecting vital spots. This is a Gamemakers trap."
A moment later Seneca walked up behind me. He laid a gentle hand on my shoulder. "Everything is a show in the Capitol. Even war," he said quietly. "Not here."
We were walking right into another Hunger Games. Our third. I laughed. Quickly. Before anyone had time to register what laid beneath the words I had just uttered. Before eyebrows were raised, objections were uttered, two and two were put together, and the solution was that I should have been kept as far away from the Capitol as possible. Because an angry, independently thinking Victor with a layer of psychological scar tissue too thick to penetrate was maybe the last person they wanted on their squad.
"I don't even know why you bothered to put Finnick and me through training, Plutarch," I said.
"Yeah, we're already the two best-equipped soldiers you have," Finnick added cockily.
"Do not think that fact escapes me," Plutarch said with an impatient wave. "Now back in line, Soldiers Odair and Antaeus. I have a presentation to finish."
"Oh, I think we're in trouble," I whispered to Finnick as we pulled Katniss away from the map.
We retreated to our places, ignoring the questioning looks that were thrown our way. Gale and Dean looked the most concerned as they looked to Katniss for an explanation. She shook her head. I adopted an attitude of extreme concentration as Plutarch continued, nodding my head here and there, shifting my position to get a better view, all the while telling myself to hang on until I could get to the woods and scream. Or curse. Or cry. Or maybe all three at once. Another trip to the Hunger Games; something I never thought I would experience.
If this was a test, Finnick and I both passed it. When Plutarch finished and the meeting was adjourned, I had a bad moment when I learned there was a special order for me. But it was merely that I skipped the military haircut because they wanted the Mockingjay to look as much like the girl in the arena as possible at the anticipated surrender. For the cameras. I shrugged to communicate that my hair length was a matter of complete indifference to me, though I did like keeping it the length it was. They dismissed me without further comment.
As we walked off I noticed that most faces remained turned toward myself and Finnick. People wanted to know how we felt about having to essentially sit through another Hunger Games. We'd both had nightmares for years because of them and we were about to do it one last time. We were going to have to go into a Hunger Games on steroids and force our families to believe that it wouldn't be as bad as we both knew it would be. Finnick and I gravitated toward each other in the hallway.
"What will I tell Annie?" he asked under his breath.
"Nothing," I answered. "That's what my mother and sister will be hearing from me."
"Katniss?" Finnick asked.
She was off with Gale, probably discussing my earlier actions with him. "She won't tell them anything. The last thing she wants is for them to be worrying about us any more than they already do," I answered.
It was bad enough that we knew we were heading back into a fully equipped arena. No use dropping it on our loved ones. All I could think was that the Games had been bad enough; to be in the Games centered around a war would be even worse. It wasn't just battling against kids or Victors. We were going to be fighting against an entire army. We were outgunned but I knew that we weren't outsmarted. We knew the Games, though so did the people in the Capitol.
"If she sees that holograph -" Finnick began.
"She won't. It's classified information. It must be. There's no way they'd let her see it. They know what's going on with her," I told him. I had to believe it was true. I had to believe they would do the same thing for Cato's family. "Anyway, it's not like an actual Games. Any number of people will survive. We're just overreacting because - well, you know why. You still want to go, don't you?"
"Of course. I want to destroy Snow as much as you do," Finnick said.
"It won't be like the others," I said firmly, trying to convince myself as well. We could all live. There was no knowledge that only one person would walk away. "This time it's all of us against him. He can't pin us against each other."
"Together," Finnick said, resting a hand on my shoulder.
Then the real beauty of the situation dawned on me. "This time Snow will be a player, too."
Which meant that I could stick that arrow right through his eye socket. Before we could continue, Haymitch appeared. He wasn't at the meeting and wasn't thinking of arenas but something else. "Johanna's back in the hospital."
Finnick and I exchanged a look. Neither one of us had seen her since the end of the exam. It hadn't dawned on me until now that it was a little odd that I hadn't seen her. Wouldn't she have wanted to tell me that she had passed, at least? Especially given the fact that we had trained together for weeks. I had assumed Johanna was fine and had passed her exam, but simply wasn't assigned to a sharpshooters' unit. She was wicked throwing an ax but about average with a gun.
"Is she hurt? What happened?" I asked worriedly.
"It was while she was on the Block. They try to ferret out a soldier's potential weaknesses. So they flooded the street," Haymitch said.
Water? That didn't make any sense. I didn't know anyone afraid of the water. It didn't help me understand what the concern was. Johanna could swim. At least, I seemed to remember her swimming around some in the Quarter Quell. She hadn't been deep in the water but I'd seen her ability to keep herself afloat. She probably had some trouble in the water but wouldn't drown. She could keep herself afloat. Not like Finnick, of course, but none of us were like Finnick.
"So?" I asked dumbly.
"That's how they tortured her in the Capitol. Soaked her and then used electric shocks," Haymitch explained. Bile rose in my throat. "In the Block, she had some kind of flashback. Panicked, didn't know where she was. She's back under sedation."
If that was what they'd done in the Block I briefly thanked Thirteen for not thinking Cato was stable enough to train like the rest of us. As angry as I was with him, I didn't want them to hurt him even more than he already had been. Finnick and I just stood there, as if we had lost the ability to respond. I thought of the way Johanna never showered. How she forced herself into the rain like it was acid that day. I had attributed her misery to the morphling withdrawal. How had I not seen it?
"You two should go see her. You're as close to friends as she's got," Haymitch said.
That made the whole thing worse. The bile in my stomach threatened to spill over. I had a feeling I would be showing my breakfast any moment now. I didn't know what was between Johanna and Finnick. They had looked close during the Games. He'd been the first to run and hug her when she'd come out of the jungle with Beetee and Wiress. But I hardly knew her. No family. No friends. Not so much as a token from Seven to set beside her regulation clothes in her anonymous drawer. Nothing.
An idea began formulating in my head. "You go first," I told Finnick.
"You sure?" Finnick asked.
"There's something I need to do before I go see her."
"Okay."
"I better go tell Plutarch. He won't be happy," Haymitch continued. "He wants as many victors as possible for the cameras to follow in the Capitol. Thinks it makes for better television."
"Are you and Beetee going?" I asked.
"As many young and attractive victors as possible," Haymitch corrected himself. "So, no. We'll be here."
"What about Brutus?" I continued.
"He'll be there once Two has completely given in. He's holding our strongholds out there for now," Haymitch explained. I nodded. He was likely still working closely with Dara to keep our weak grasp on Two. "His eyesight isn't what it used to be. He won't be assigned to a sharpshooter unit when it's time. You likely won't run into him."
I wasn't sure if that made me happy or not. "Okay."
Finnick went directly down to see Johanna, but I lingered outside a few minutes until Boggs came out. He was my commander now, so I guessed he was the one to ask for any special favors. I could have asked Seneca too, but I wasn't ready to speak to him yet. I wasn't sure what I could say that wouldn't be about the pods. When I found Boggs and told him what I wanted to do, he wrote me a pass so that I could go to the woods during Reflection, provided I stayed within sight of the guards.
It made me feel like an infant being cared for by their parents but I couldn't let that bother me. This was about Johanna. I ran to my compartment, thinking to use the parachute, but it was so full of ugly memories. Instead, I went across the hall and took one of the white cotton bandages I brought from Twelve. Square. Sturdy. Just the thing. I darted back out of the compartment and into the hallway, almost immediately being cut off by Alana. She looked shocked to see how frantic I was.
"Aspen. Where are you going?" Alana asked.
"The woods. I've got something I need to do," I said.
"Honey -"
"I'm not going out there to... I'm not offing myself," I interrupted, seeing the worried look on Alana's face. She looked a little relieved to see that I wasn't ready to leave yet. "There's something I want to do for Johanna. She won't be going to the Capitol so I think she needs something else to make her smile. She's been kind to me since getting here. Kind of. I thought I should repay the favor."
Alana smiled. "That's sweet of you. Particularly since Johanna isn't known for her kindness."
"She can surprise you," I said, surprising myself with my defense of her. "And I'm working on it."
Alana gave me a calculating look. I knew that she was waiting for me to tell her what I was going to do. "I hear you were assigned to a sharpshooter squad for deployment to the Capitol," she finally said.
"I was."
"The same one as Skye, Julie, and Dean."
Of course. Those other two seats were for Skye and Julie. I should have known. "I was."
"Are you certain it's the best idea?"
"You're my mother-in-law, Alana, and you've been wonderful to me since we met. I love you and your entire family."
"Our family," Alana corrected.
"Right, our family," I said awkwardly. "You should all know by now that I can't just stay here and wait for it to be over. I can't. I have to be out there doing something and helping the war. I'm sure they feel the same. I'll be honest, I can't be here with Cato like this. I can't see him every day in the training yard and dining room and still have any semblance of happiness."
Seeing him was like getting a knife to the heart each time. He looked like he was tempted to kill me each time we met eyes. "Honey, I understand. I just don't want you giving up on him," Alana said quietly.
I swallowed thickly. "I haven't. But I need to be away from here for a while. I still haven't moved past what happened," I muttered.
Alana's eyes drooped. "It's hard. Losing -"
"Please, don't," I interrupted frantically. "I'm sorry but, please... I can't."
Alana immediately backtracked. "I'm sorry. It's your choice whether or not you ever want to talk about it."
"For now I don't."
"Understood." We stood in silence for a moment. "You'll say goodbye before you go?"
"Yes, of course," I told her. "Alana, I'm sorry for the quick departure but there is something I need to do before dark."
"Oh, of course," Alana said, stepping to the side. "Enjoy."
"Absolutely. I'll see you and the rest of the family later," I said.
We exchanged a quick hug as we turned to leave. She was likely going back to spend some time with her family. I headed out toward the woods. I didn't need to grab any of my weapons. Not for what I was doing. I headed outside and stumbled along the pathway, likely startling off any animals in close vicinity. It was a good thing that Gale wasn't out there trying to collect game. He had always hated when I'd made noise and scared off animals during a hunt; my laugh was usually the cause.
The guards at the edge of the woods didn't look too thrilled with the idea of me heading out but I promised what I had also promised Boggs. I stayed in their sight, barely a few yards out from the fences. At the edge of the woods, I found a pine tree and stripped handfuls of fragrant needles from the boughs. After making a neat pile in the middle of the bandage, I gathered up the sides, twisted them, and tied them tightly with a length of vine, making an apple-sized bundle.
Once I was done, I practically sprinted full-speed back toward the hospital, almost bowling over the people I was trying to pass. At the hospital room door, I watched Johanna for a moment, realizing that most of her ferocity was in her abrasive attitude. Stripped of that, as she was now, there was only a slight young woman, her wide-set eyes fighting to stay awake against the power of the drugs. Terrified of what sleep would bring. I understood that losing battle. I crossed to her and held out the bundle.
"What's that?" Johanna asked hoarsely. Damp edges of her hair formed little spikes over her forehead.
"I made it for you. Something to put in your drawer." I placed it in her hands. "Smell it."
She lifted the bundle to her nose and took a tentative sniff. "Smells like home." Tears flooded her eyes.
"That's what I was hoping. You being from Seven and all," I said. "Remember when we met? You were a tree. Well, briefly."
A small smile tilted up on her lips before falling. "About that -"
"It's fine, Johanna," I said, waving her off. I knew that she didn't want Cato, she just wanted to make me uncomfortable. "It was forever ago... and it was kind of funny."
She was certainly bolder than I had ever been. Johanna smiled. Suddenly, the smile was gone and she had my wrist in an iron grip. "You have to kill him, Aspen," Johanna practically begged.
"Don't worry." I resisted the temptation to wrench my arm free. "I don't need anyone to tell me that."
"Swear it. On something you care about," she hissed.
"I swear it. On my life."
But she didn't let go of my arm. "On your family's life," she insisted.
"On my family's life," I repeated.
She was smart enough to know that I didn't care about my life. I supposed that everyone knew that my concern for my survival wasn't a compelling enough argument. They all knew that I had no intention to walk out of the war alive. All that mattered was that I used my last few weeks on this planet to do something. All that mattered was that if I went out, Snow went out with me. Johanna let go of my arm and I rubbed my wrist.
"Why do you think I'm going, anyway, brainless?" I teased.
That made her smile a little. "I just needed to hear it." She pressed the bundle of pine needles to her nose and closed her eyes.
The remaining days went by in a whirl. After a brief workout each morning, my squad was on the shooting range full-time in training. I practiced mostly with a gun, but they reserved an hour a day for specialty weapons, which meant that I got to use my Mockingjay bow, Katniss my old one, and Gale his heavy militarized one. The trident Beetee designed for Finnick had a lot of special features, but the most remarkable was that he could throw it, press a button on a metal cuff on his wrist, and return it to his hand without chasing it down.
It wasn't just the Mockingjay bow I got to use. My knives were all sorts of different kinds. Some sharp and short enough to slice someone's throat with a bare touch. Serrated and easily able to cut through a thick wood. Blades strong enough to pierce metal and the armor of Peacekeeper uniforms. Some so long they almost resembled miniature swords. Others were so small that I could be able to hide them in my palm and, if cornered, use the blade to cut out someone's eyes.
The worry was evident in Dean's voice when I had voiced that idea. He was concerned that I was becoming unhinged - a concern that was warranted. Sometimes we shot at Peacekeeper dummies to become familiar with the weaknesses in their protective gear. The chinks in the armor, so to speak. At the throat just below the chin, the joint between the arm and shoulder, and the lower center intestines. If you hit flesh, you were rewarded with a burst of fake blood. Our dummies were soaked in red.
It was reassuring to see just how high the overall level of accuracy was in our group. No one missed. Our worst shots scratched the edges of the uniforms - a nonfatal shot but one that would slow down a Peacekeeper. Along with Finnick, Gale, Katniss, Julie, and Skye, the squad included five soldiers from Thirteen. Jackson, a middle-aged woman who was Boggs's second in command, looked kind of sluggish but could hit things the rest of us couldn't even see without a scope. Farsighted, she said.
There was a pair of sisters in their twenties named Leeg - we called them Leeg 1 and Leeg 2 for clarity - who were so similar in uniform, I couldn't tell them apart until I noticed Leeg 1 had weird yellow flecks in her eyes. They were nice but didn't speak much besides to each other. Two older guys, Mitchell and Homes, never said much but could shoot the dust off your boots at fifty yards. Dean was extraordinarily accurate with a gun but was also just as good as Cato was with a sword.
It was a little hard to see at first. He used one similar to the broadsword Cato had used in my first Games. Were it not for his brown hair, I would have thought he was Cato. Julie was just slightly better than Skye with her rifle. Both were stunning with knives. Skye could anticipate movements from a mile away. Julie seemed to always know where people would be moving from. I saw other squads that were also quite good, but I didn't fully understand our status until the morning Plutarch joined us.
"Squad Four-Five-One, you have been selected for a special mission," Plutarch began. I bit the inside of my lip, hoping against hope that it was to assassinate Snow. "We have numerous sharpshooters, but rather a dearth of camera crews. Therefore, we've handpicked the eight of you to be what we call our 'Star Squad.' You will be the on-screen faces of the invasion."
Disappointment, shock, and then anger ran through the group. How could we have thought that we were going to be walking into the middle of the battle? It should have been obvious that we wouldn't. We were some of the most notable figures in Panem right now. The moment the Peacekeepers saw us, we were sure to be the main targets. But it didn't make sense. Why were people like Homes and the Leeg sisters in our group? They were better off on the front lines, where we were supposed to be.
"The celebrities," I mumbled.
"What you're saying is, we won't be in actual combat," Gale snapped.
"You will be in combat, but perhaps not always on the front line. If one can even isolate a front line in this type of war," Plutarch said.
"None of us wants that," Finnick snapped. His remark was followed by a general rumble of assent, but I stayed silent. "We're going to fight."
"You're going to be as useful to the war effort as possible. And it's been decided that you are of most value on television. Just look at the effect Aspen had running around in that Mockingjay suit. Turned the whole rebellion around. Do you notice how she's the only one not complaining?" Plutarch asked. The others looked surprised to see what I wasn't complaining as I would have normally been the loudest. "It's because she understands the power of that screen."
Actually, Aspen wasn't complaining because she had no intention of staying with the 'Star Squad,' but she recognized the necessity of getting to the Capitol before carrying out any plan. If they were going to bring me to the Capitol I wouldn't complain. That was my main concern. Katniss shot me a strange look and I nodded at her. She knew what I was thinking. Neither one of us could afford to irritate the others right now. Still, to be too compliant might have aroused suspicion as well.
"But it's not all pretend, is it?" I asked. "That'd be a waste of talent."
"Don't worry," Plutarch told me. "You'll have plenty of real targets to hit. But don't get blown up. I've got enough on my plate without having to replace you. Now get to the Capitol and put on a good show."
"Nice to hear," I said.
Two days passed before we were scheduled to be shipped out with the rest of the troops to the Capitol. I threw myself into training so deeply that I spent barely two hours a night sleeping. It worried the others but made my shooting even better. It was now to the point that I never missed. I had something to focus on. I had my anger and hatred toward the Capitol. I shot everything in sight, even moving to the other's targets after a while.
The morning we shipped out, I said good-bye to my family. I still hadn't told them how much the Capitol's defenses mirrored the weapons in the arena, but Katniss and me going off to war was awful enough on its own. They didn't need to know what the war was going to look like. Ms. Everdeen held us both tightly for a long time. I felt tears on her cheek, something she suppressed when I was slated for the Games. Maybe she could see the look in my eyes; the look that said there was no chance I was coming back this time.
"Don't worry. We'll be perfectly safe. We're not even real soldiers. Just some of Plutarch's televised puppets," I reassured her.
"Stay together," Ms. Everdeen told us.
"Always," Katniss and I said together.
"Love you, Mom," I told Ms. Everdeen.
She took my arm tightly in her grasp. "Come back home, you hear me?"
"Yes, ma'am," I said.
Ms. Everdeen knew that I wasn't planning on walking away from the war. The look in her eyes was almost enough to stop me from attempting my mission. It was the most serious I had seen her look since Mr. Everdeen died. Katniss and I exchanged another nervous look. I knew that Katniss would follow me directly into the battlefield. Whatever happened to me was destined to happen to her too. But they didn't need to know that. Prim walked us as far as the hospital doors.
"How do you feel?" she asked us.
"Better than I have in a long time," I told her.
"Better, knowing you're somewhere Snow can't reach you," Katniss added.
"Next time we see each other, we'll be free of him," Prim said firmly.
If we somehow managed to walk away from the war, we would never have to worry about Snow meddling in our lives again. The dust storm from the war would be horrible but we would at least be free. That was only if we somehow made it out of the warzone. For now, I would give them that hope. The three of us stared at each other before Prim threw her arms around our necks. We stood together for a long time and I smiled as I pressed my face down into Prim's hair.
We pulled away after a few minutes as I leaned down in front of Prim, taking her hands in mine. "It's why we're doing this, kiddo. You know that, right?" I asked her. Prim nodded slowly, looking much braver now than she had before my first Games. "We need to have a world without him where you get a chance to grow up without having to worry about Snow and the Games."
"Just make sure you get back here," Prim said.
Katniss jabbed her arm into my back at my hesitation. "Of course," I told her.
"Be careful," Prim said.
"We love you," Katniss told her.
"Love you both, too," Prim said.
"Take care of yourself and take care of Mom," I added.
"I will," Prim said.
"Ladies," Alana greeted.
We both looked back to see that Alana was at the end of the hallway with the rest of the Hadley family who would be staying behind in Thirteen. I smiled at them as Prim walked back into the hospital. "I'll wait for you," Katniss said. I nodded as she began her goodbyes with the Hadley's. "See you all in a few weeks."
She sounded much more confident in her goodbyes than I had been. There was a chorus of goodbyes as they all hugged Katniss and wished her well, promising that they would see her when we returned. Katniss smiled at them as she walked off, leaving me with half of my in-laws. I gave them all a somewhat happy smile as I walked up to them. Alana, Damien, Carrie, Aidan, and Marley were those who were staying behind. Dean, Skye, and Julie were going to the Capitol. Cato obviously couldn't handle himself in a war zone.
"I'm glad you're not all going. It's good to know that you'll all be safe here," I told them as Katniss rounded the corner. "I think I would go insane if you were all out there."
"We'll be right here doing what we can," Alana said.
"Anything helps. You not being out there helps me focus," I said truthfully.
As Carrie walked toward me I noticed that her eyes were red and puffy. She had been crying. "Aspen, I know it's horrible of me to ask you, but -"
"I'll keep an eye on him, Carrie. I promise," I interrupted her, knowing what she was going to ask me.
"Thank you," Carrie said her voice breaking. "Thank you."
"He's my brother, no matter what. I'll keep an eye on everyone," I told them.
"Thank you, dear," Alana said gratefully.
"Take care of yourself first," Damien said.
"We haven't always gotten along, Damien, but -"
"You're my son's wife, Aspen," Damien interrupted, laying a hand on my shoulder. I smiled up at him. Maybe I had once been his son's wife, but we weren't together anymore. We never would be again. "Whether or not we've always gotten along means nothing. If Cato loves you, that's good enough for me. You're one of ours."
"I appreciate that, Damien," I told him honestly. It was nice to know that all of the Hadley's supported me. Marley giggled as Carrie walked up to me again. I smiled down at her. "Hi, sweetie. Take care of everyone, all right?"
"Are you leaving?" Marley asked me.
"For a while," I answered her.
"Where?"
"It's a little trip, Marley. It won't be too fun, I promise you're not missing anything."
"Is Cato going?"
"No, honey," I said, swallowing my nerves. "Cato is away for a while. He needs to take care of himself for a bit."
"Is he coming back?"
Marley deserved to have her uncle back. She deserved to have someone to go to whenever she needed help. He deserved to have one of his favorite people in the world around him. "Eventually, I hope," I told her. "I promise he'll come straight to you when he does."
Marley giggled, completely unaware of what was going on. "Bye, Aspen."
"Bye, sweetie. Take care," I said, running my fingers through her dark blonde hair.
Carrie and I exchanged a tense look as she took Marley away. She was almost immediately replaced with a very grumpy-looking Aidan. "I want to come with you," Aidan growled, folding his arms over his chest.
"No, you don't and I don't want you there," I said worriedly. "I'm glad that you're all here and out of harm's way."
"I could help out there," Aidan said.
Having one more of the Hadley's in the Capitol would have been a nightmare. They couldn't lose more members of their family. "You know where you can help?" I asked him. Aidan shook his head. "You can help right here. Take care of everyone. Keep your mom and dad from worrying about you. Keep me from worrying about you."
"I don't want you going out there alone," Aidan said.
"I won't be alone. I promise."
"Be careful."
"Of course. You too."
We may not have always seen eye-to-eye but Aidan was now one of the Hadley's I was the closest to. I leaned down and hugged the young boy for a long time. He kept a tight grip on me before finally releasing me and stepping back. I turned to Alana, who pulled me into her and whispered in my ear, "Promise us we will see you again. Alive."
I put on the most honest look I could. "I promise," I said, smiling at Alana and turning to the others. "Time to go."
"Good luck, Aspen," they all said.
"Bye, everyone," I called back. They all turned to leave. If they didn't leave now I had a feeling they never would. I waited to speak again until Alana was the last Hadley standing. "Wait for a second, Alana." She turned back to me with a curious look. "Give him the life I never could." Alana opened her mouth to speak when I spoke over her again. "Please, don't ever let him think of me."
"Aspen -"
"Promise me," I interrupted sharply.
"I can't do that," Alana said quietly.
"Please, Alana. If you've ever seen me as a part of your family, promise me that you'll take care of him and never mention me," I begged.
"He wouldn't want that," Alana said.
"He would. He does," I replied weakly.
Alana's eyes turned glassy. "We will always love you," she whispered. "All of us."
"I know," I mumbled.
Alana and I wrapped each other in a tight hug as I buried my head into my mother-in-law's shoulder. We held each other tightly and I smiled weakly as I pressed my mouth into her shoulder. I loved the Hadley's and loved the fact that after so many years alone I had a real family. They were a part of my family. I knew that they would remember me for a long time after I died. Even if they never mentioned me to my husband again. When we finally broke apart I gave her a simple smile, hopefully, the part of me she would always remember.
Walking away from them was hard but I knew that it was time. It was time to leave Thirteen and never return. This was my final act. I considered saying a final goodbye to Cato but decided quickly that it would only be bad for both of us. A painful reminder that we didn't belong to each other any longer. But I did slip the pearl into the pocket of my uniform. A token of the real man behind the Career. I took a deep breath and walked back over to where Katniss was waiting for me.
"Are you ready?" I asked her.
She gave me a strained smile as she nodded. "Absolutely."
We had barely turned when we were interrupted. "Soldier Antaeus."
"What?" I asked, looking at the unfamiliar man.
"You will not be reporting to the departure bay," the man replied.
"Excuse me?" I stuttered.
"You've been recommended as inadvisable for active duty," he said.
"I was already assigned," I snapped.
"We've reassessed."
Was he kidding? "You can't do that," Katniss hissed.
The dream of putting my arrow through Snow's eye socket was flying away from me faster than a Capitol hovercraft. "We will have you ready and flown to the Capitol for the surrender, just as the plan was originally," the man said.
"I was approved for Four-Five-One! It's not even a real combat unit," I shouted, which wasn't a convincing argument on my part.
"I'm sorry. You'll have to bring this argument to Command," the man said.
As I was already planning on doing. "Who said that I was unsuitable for active duty?" I snarled.
"I don't know."
"We'll go and figure something out," Katniss told me.
No. One of us had to get out there. I had to make sure someone did what needed to be done. "We will do nothing. They're calling for Four-Five-One now," I said, spotting our unit's number coming up on the departure screens. I pulled Katniss in for a hug and lowered my voice. "Go. Kill him."
"What?" she asked, pulling out of my grasp.
"I'll figure something out. Go," I told her.
Katniss shook her head. "Aspen -"
"Go. I'll be out there. Don't worry," I said. We looked at each other for a long time. "Be careful out there, all right?"
Katniss finally nodded, probably only because she knew that I was too stubborn to stay here. I could figure my own way to the Capitol. "Of course. I'll see you soon," she said.
"Definitely." We exchanged another long hug before breaking apart. Katniss walked off, looking back at me briefly. I nodded at her reassuringly before turning back to the man. "Bring me to Command," I demanded.
"I believe there is a meeting in -"
"I don't care," I interrupted. "Bring me to Command."
With all the times they interrupted me when I didn't want to talk, I could do it to them. Especially in this situation. I walked through the halls with the man at my side as we headed toward Command. The man looked at me but I was pointed in ignoring him. I didn't need him with me as I knew where Command was, but I wanted to have someone standing at my side. We barged right into the middle of a meeting with Seneca, Coin, Haymitch, Plutarch, and Beetee. There were some others there I didn't know. They all looked up at me.
"Soldier Antaeus, we are in the middle of a meeting," Coin said calmly.
"I don't care," I snapped.
"Aspen -"
"I'm not talking to you," I snarled, interrupting Haymitch. He would just tell me to get out. I turned back to Coin with the nastiest look I could muster. She looked unaffected. "What the hell are you thinking? I've already passed all the requirements. I was assigned to Four-Five-One. You can't just tell me that I'm not suited for active duty."
"You've been reevaluated and deemed unfit," Coin said.
"Why?" I asked.
"We can talk about this when the meeting is over," Coin said.
"I'm already here. We can talk about it now," I told her.
"Contain your emotions, Soldier Antaeus," Coin said, an almost teasing note to her voice. My teeth ground together. "They will get the best of you."
Sensing that the conversation was going to take a nasty turn, Seneca rose from his seat and turned to the others. "Pardon us for a moment," he said, walking over to my side and taking my arm. He lowered his voice to speak only to me. "Aspen. Come along."
"What? No, damn you!" I snapped, trying to pull away from him. "I need to get to the -"
"Just come with me!" Seneca barked, oddly demanding for once.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
He pulled me out of Command and practically threw me into the hallway. "We're not going anywhere. You are going to go and find a place to calm down," Seneca said. My jaw practically dropped. There was no way in hell that I was leaving to go calm down. "Come to my compartment later and we'll talk."
"But -"
"Now. Do you trust me?"
"Yes. But -"
"Go back to your compartment and come see me later," Seneca said.
"Fine. Fine," I growled.
He was going to be of no help right now. I growled irritably under my breath as I turned and walked off, stomping down the hallway. I muttered a nasty swear under my breath as I walked, bumping through the crowd. Seneca had better have a good excuse for what had just happened and he had better be able to get me to the Capitol. I wandered back to the compartment I shared with Johanna and stormed in, still growling to myself in frustration. Johanna, mounted on the bed, looked up at me in surprise.
"I thought you were leaving this morning," Johanna said.
"Someone said I wasn't suited for active duty. They're concerned that I'll go rogue," I sneered.
Johanna laughed. "Finally, they're right about something."
"Fair, but I need to find a way to the Capitol. He needs to see my eyes when I kill him," I told her.
Johanna's mostly-dead eyes sparkled at my words. I could see the gears turning in her head. "Now you're talking. You need to find a way to the Capitol when everybody's looking the other way. I heard the medics talking," Johanna said. I nodded for her to continue. "They're shipping supplies for the front line from hangar two around midnight tonight. Medicine, painkillers. I was going to go steal some for myself, but I guess I could just stay here and cover for you."
Hangar two at midnight. I could handle that. "Thank you, Johanna. I knew you'd help," I said.
She nodded. "Anybody can kill anybody, Aspen. Even a president. You just have to be willing to sacrifice yourself."
"I am."
"I know. Good luck."
"Thank you, for everything."
"Don't thank me," Johanna said.
We may not have been best friends but we were two people who understood each other well. We knew what the other needed. The two of us stared at each other and nodded. Johanna laid a hand on my leg as she rose from her bed and walked off. I spent much of the afternoon staring at the ceiling as I laid back on the bed. I knew that I should have gone and told my family what I was going to do - as they would be thrilled that I wasn't going to the Capitol - but I couldn't risk them accidentally spreading the truth to someone else.
So, I laid back in my bed and waited out the clock. There was nothing else to do. I couldn't risk running into anyone. Johanna returned a little after dinner and nodded for me to leave. I smiled at my friend and placed a hand on her shoulder as I walked off. I planned on heading to the hangar immediately but there was one person I needed to talk to before leaving. I wasn't sure what I wanted to say to him or what he had to say to me, but I knew that we needed this moment to say our final goodbyes.
In the back of my mind, I knew that I should have been getting ready to hide with the shipment of goods. I knew that I needed some time to be silent and figure out what I would do when I landed with the troops but I couldn't bring myself to do that. Instead, I walked through the halls of Thirteen for a moment before winding up outside of Seneca's door - the only person I hadn't said goodbye to yet. After a moment of debating it, I knocked. Seneca opened the door and smiled down at me.
"Good evening," Seneca greeted.
I smiled weakly. "Can I come in?"
"Always," Seneca said. He stepped to the side as I walked in and seated myself on the edge of his bed. Seneca sat at the other end. "I would have suggested your escape plan but I see someone else beat me to it."
"You spoke with Johanna," I said.
"No," Seneca answered. I arched my eyebrow in confusion. "You'll be sneaking out with the shipment of goods tonight?"
Seneca knew me better than anyone else in the world. "Didn't need to even say anything," I said, chuckling under my breath. "But how did you know? Was it what you were planning on telling me earlier?"
Seneca shook his head. "No. I couldn't tell you. They would find out I told you and I would never hear the end of it. I told you to leave because I knew you would go to your compartment and meet up with your roommate," Seneca explained. I shook my head. I still didn't understand. "Who do you think got those medics talking in the hallway Johanna always lingers in?"
I laughed breathlessly. "Thank you."
At least someone knew I needed to get to the Capitol. I knew that I could rely on Seneca to get me where I needed to go. "We know each other well, Aspen," Seneca said. I nodded my agreement. "I can't say that I blame you. I knew that you wouldn't just sit here. We all know it. They think that you're going to stay and do something foolish once the war is over."
"They're that stupid to think that I'd wait?" I snorted.
"You'd think that they'd learn," Seneca teased.
"But they never do," I finished. We both laughed but I stopped short when I remembered something. "Do you know who suggested that I wasn't suited for active duty?"
Seneca let out a deep breath. "Aspen -"
"You do," I interrupted. "Who?"
"Remember that people only try to keep you out of fighting because they're afraid that you're going to do something to get yourself hurt. No one is doing this to try and upset you or keep you from getting your revenge," Seneca said gently.
"Just tell me," I growled impatiently.
"Dean Hadley," Seneca said.
I laughed humorlessly. "Of course."
It shouldn't have and didn't come as a shock that Dean was the one to suggest I stay behind. He was getting a punch dead in the nose the next time I saw him. "He's your brother, Aspen. He doesn't want to see you get yourself hurt," Seneca said defensively.
"Too late," I said.
Seneca paled slightly. "That's not what I meant."
"I know." We sat in silence for so long that it became almost comical. "It feels like there are a thousand things we should be saying to each other right now."
"But if we began speaking, would we ever stop?" Seneca asked.
"I don't think so. I'll miss you, you know?"
Being away from Seneca would probably be one of the hardest things about going to the Capitol. "That's something you probably never thought you would say two years ago," Seneca teased. I smiled and shook my head. We had come a long way since the first time we'd met. "I will miss you as well. You've become a good friend to me over the years."
"So have you," I said, reaching over to take his hand. "Promise me something?"
"Anything," Seneca said.
"When this is all over and the dust settles, don't go back to the Capitol. Don't take on some high-profile job like Plutarch will," I told Seneca. He stared at me. "Find somewhere quiet and peaceful to live. Go somewhere out of the public eye. Make a new life for yourself out there. A life that makes you forget all this. Find something or someone that makes you happy. Get a new hobby. Anything to make this feel like a distant memory. Do it for both of us."
"I promise," Seneca said, smiling down at me. "I look forward to seeing where your peaceful life takes you."
I let out a deep breath. He knew the truth of what I was going to do. "Seneca -"
Seneca shook his head. "No more." I stopped speaking instantly as he motioned toward the door. "You need to be on your way, anyway. The shipment leaves in an hour."
"Okay," I said. But I didn't move. I just stared at him. I knew that he was getting ready to say goodbye so I cut him off. "Don't."
"I won't say it," Seneca said.
He was the one person that I didn't think I could handle saying goodbye to. We stood from the bed and exchanged a painfully long hug. I could hear the clock ticking away the minutes as I tucked my head into his shoulder. His hands wound around my back and pressed into my hair. My heart pattered slightly as we remained locked together. I loved the feeling that I had with Seneca; the same one I had once had with Gale. But this was even stronger. I didn't know what this feeling was.
When the two of us finally pulled apart, I stared up at Seneca for a long time. He smiled comfortingly down at me. I wasn't sure exactly what came over me at that moment, but I wanted to show him just how much I cared for him. Plus, I needed to know. I needed to be sure. So, I leaned up and pressed a soft kiss against his mouth. He looked and felt shocked. His body tensed slightly at my touch. Eventually, Seneca relaxed and kissed me back, his hand coming to rest against my neck under my ear.
His arm slid around my back to keep me pressed against him. There was something sweet about the kiss. It wasn't something I had expected. It wasn't a kiss that Cato would give me. There was no heat. There was no passion. But there was something in the kiss that was something I'd never felt before. It was beautiful. It was a kiss that didn't feel romantic at all. It was comforting. It was a kiss that belonged between two best friends and nothing more. We stayed together for a long time before finally pulling back.
Seneca was smiling but there was still a vague look of shock on his face. "What was that?" he asked gently.
Even though we had broken the kiss, Seneca still had me pressed against him. "We've kissed quite a few times before. But we've never done it when we both genuinely cared for each other. I just wanted to do it once. I felt like we both deserved to know," I told him. I'd had to be sure that nothing unspoken was still between us. "Sorry, it just came over me."
Seneca smiled as he pushed my hair behind my ears. "Don't apologize. I understand," he told me. "I think I can honestly say that we both are pleased that there was nothing more behind that kiss."
"No," I agreed. "But I'm glad it happened."
"As am I."
"Take care of yourself, Seneca," I said, pressing a hand against his cheek.
"You as well, Aspen." We exchanged another quick hug as he pressed a kiss against my cheek. When we pulled back, I smiled weakly at him. "I have something for you before you go," Seneca told me. I arched a brow curiously. "Take this."
Seneca reached into his pocket and handed me a small piece of metal that looked like my communicator Haymitch had given me. "What is it?" I asked.
"It's set with a direct line to my pager. You have someone here you can rely on," Seneca told me. I nodded gratefully. He could direct me when it came time to go after Snow. "Ensure this isn't the last time we speak."
"It won't be," I promised.
We still didn't speak as I hugged Seneca a final time. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders as he buried his face into my hair. We stood together for a while before I forced myself to pull away. We exchanged a painful smile as I turned to leave his compartment. The door hissed shut behind me and I took a deep breath as I walked off, knowing that if I turned back to him, I would never leave. I headed toward the hangar before stopping short. There was something I had to do.
The smart thing to do would have been to turn and go to the hangar, boarding the hovercraft that was bringing supplies to the Capitol. Before I could tell myself that it was the wrong thing to do, I stopped and turned back toward the hospital. I knew that it wasn't the most brilliant idea, but I wanted to see him. One final time. We both had things that we still needed to say. So, I walked into the hospital wing toward the solo hallway that held Cato's room. The guards stopped me in my tracks.
"Soldier Antaeus, we can't have you in here," the first man said.
"Ask him. Ask him if he'll talk to me," I half-begged. The two men who were guarding Cato's room looked unconvinced. "Please."
The men exchanged another look before the second man nodded. "Wait here," he told me.
"Thank you," I breathed, happy that they would at least try.
Both men turned and walked into Cato's room. I stood awkwardly outside of his medical bay for a long time. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do other than just stand here and wait to see if Cato was willing to speak to me. The seconds turned into minutes. Almost three entire minutes passed before the door reopened and the first soldier stepped out. By the look on his face, I was expecting him to shake his head and tell me that Cato didn't want to see me, which would have been understandable.
"Don't be long," the first man said.
I was almost shocked that he wanted to see me. "Thanks," I muttered dumbly.
Of course, now I had no idea what I wanted to say. I pushed into the room and past the soldiers. I was a little surprised that they closed the door behind me. But I wasn't stupid. I knew that they would be watching what happened closely. As I walked in, I noticed that there was a chair just a few feet away from the bed Cato was perched on. He wasn't wearing his cuffs. I cleared my throat nervously and walked over to his bed, suddenly aware that I didn't prepare a speech for him. I didn't know what I was here to say.
"Can I sit?" I asked him.
"Sure," Cato said.
We sat in silence for such a long time that I began wondering why I had come here. I didn't have a good reason for being here. I had just made things even tenser. I wasn't sure what I should have said or done. Not hug him. Not kiss him. Not make a joke. Not even crack a smile. That was too awkward. There was nothing to be done here other than sit and wait for one of us to make the first move. It didn't take long for me to realize that it wouldn't be me. Ultimately, it was Cato.
"Is this your attempt at saying goodbye?" Cato asked coldly.
"Yeah," I said stupidly.
"I thought they were just flying you in for the surrender."
"They want to. But I'm not doing that. I've let myself be a puppet for too long. I have to do this one myself."
"So, this is goodbye."
"A one-way ticket," I replied. I wanted him to say something. I wanted him to follow in his mother's footsteps and tell me that I needed to come back alive, but I wasn't shocked that he settled with a simple nod. "I'm not sure what I came to say."
"Our conversations used to flow so easily, didn't they?" Cato asked.
Unfortunately, those days of goofing around on the phone or rolling around playfully in bed were long over. "We used to always know what to say to each other. I guess those days are long gone," I muttered sadly. "It seems like I don't know what to say to anyone anymore. Not even people I've known my entire life."
Cato nodded understandingly. "That makes two of us. The way my family looks at me now... it's like they think I'll break or snap at the slightest noise. The way you look at me," Cato continued his voice hardening slightly. My head snapped up toward him. "Like I'm an injured animal and you're not sure if you want to help me, run away and save yourself, or put me out of my misery."
I immediately began shaking my head. "That's not -"
"I'm not asking what you think you're doing. I'm telling you what you are," Cato interrupted harshly.
A lump formed in my throat. He was correct. "Yeah," I said weakly. "You're right."
"Is that the first time you've been honest about it?" Cato asked.
Being around Cato was worse now than it ever had been before. I was more afraid and uncomfortable now than I had been back when he had been my biggest competition in the first Games. "Yes. But I don't want to hurt you. I've hurt you enough," I said, trying not to pity myself too much. Cato nodded slowly. "Do you want to hurt me?"
It wasn't something I wanted to think about, but it was something I was curious about. Cato stared at me. "I'm not sure. Sometimes I have the urge to laugh when I see you. Some vague memory of something funny you said once. Sometimes I want to kiss you. I remember your words," Cato admitted. I almost smiled until he continued. "I'm not sure whether or not they were scripted. Yes, sometimes I get the urge to kill you. Put my hands around your throat and tighten them until you start twitching and finally... just stop moving."
"Okay. Stop," I gasped, horrified by the thought.
"Does that bother you?" Cato asked tonelessly.
"Of course," I said.
Cato nodded. "It bothers me too. Because I don't know what I want. I know that I love you. I know that I hate you. Back and forth all goddamn day," Cato snarled. I couldn't help but jump slightly in my chair. His head was so much more scrambled than I'd thought it was. My heart broke for him as his eyes turned down in sadness. "I must have loved you. I remember what they did to me in the Capitol. Do you want to know what they did?"
"No," I said honestly and very selfishly.
"Why not?" Cato asked curiously. "I lived through it. I was the one it hurt. I'm the one who went through it all, for you."
"I know and I'm -"
"Don't tell me you're sorry," Cato snarled, the edge creeping back into his voice. "Sorry won't fix anything."
My stomach churned as his eyes contracted and dilated a few times. The fight in his head was beginning again. He looked terrible. I noticed his pupils blowing up before finally reducing themselves back to their normal size. As much as I hated to admit it, I found myself terrified of what had just happened. Was he about to try and kill me? I didn't know. It took us both a moment to calm down. I blinked away the forming tears in my eyes and slowed my heart rate as he released the tense grip he'd had on the mattress.
Breathing out steadily a few times, I finally managed to gather my thoughts and spit out a halfway intelligent statement. "I didn't come here to make things worse," I whispered.
"Why did you come?" Cato asked.
Why had I come? Maybe I'd had a little useless hope that he would have made a huge leap forward and admit that he loved and would miss me. "Honestly, I'm not sure. I guess I just wanted to let you know that I do still care about you. And I will until I die," I told him honestly. He nodded. "And if it makes any difference, I hope that you never think about me again once I'm gone."
"Unfortunately, I don't think that will ever be the case," Cato said.
Instead of making me feel a little bit better, it made me feel ten times worse. "You deserved better than me," I told him.
Cato shook his head. "Probably not. Do either one of us deserve goodness?"
"Why not?" I asked.
"We're not the heroes, Aspen. We never were."
"We don't have to be the villains either."
"Maybe. Didn't you once tell me that I was exactly what you were expecting?" Cato asked.
My head snapped up. Of all the bits of our conversations he had to remember, it was that one? The one that made me sound like I thought he was a monster. "Yes. But I told you before we left that you were nothing like I was expecting. I stand by that," I said, resisting the urge to reach out and take his hand. "You're not the bad guy."
He wasn't the bad guy. He was one of the best people I'd ever had the pleasure of coming across. Cato stared at me for a long time. We didn't speak for a while as we met eyes. I felt my throat tighten with the threat of tears. I didn't know what to say to him that wouldn't upset him. I wanted him to forgive me but I knew that he wasn't capable of it. Not right now. For a moment, I wished I hadn't come to see him. This was a harder conversation than I was expecting. It was a long time before Cato spoke again.
"What would you have named it?"
The comment was so sudden and so surprising that I almost fell out of my chair. "What?" I gasped.
"The baby. What would you have named it?" Cato repeated.
The baby... A thought I hadn't allowed myself to linger on. "I - I..." I felt myself panting and breathing heavily, unsure of what I was supposed to say. I couldn't think of it. Thinking of what I had lost broke my heart in a way I didn't know it could be. "I - I - I didn't get long enough to know that I was even... to think about it. I don't know."
"Emilia?" Cato asked.
"How did you know?" I asked, knowing I had never mentioned it to him. "That it was her name?"
"I don't remember. I think I tried to learn about her for you."
"It could have been Leah," I offered. We stared at each other again. Why had I brought up his deceased sister? "I'm sorry."
Cato waved off my concern. "Don't be. That's the least of what's hurt me lately."
Of course. I was the one who had hurt him and continued to hurt him. "It's a stupid question but how are you feeling?" I asked nervously.
"That's an extremely stupid question," Cato said, chuckling humorlessly. I felt a little spout of anger. I was trying to make things a little better but he was non-receptive. To my surprise, Cato almost looked like he felt guilty. "I'm sorry."
He had nothing to be sorry about. This one was all on me. "Don't apologize to me. I get it," I said, looking him in the eye, desperate to make him understand that I wanted the best for him. "I want to know that you're going to be okay."
Cato shook his head. "I don't think I can guarantee that."
"Your life will at least be better without me in it," I mumbled.
Cato stared me dead in the eyes as he said, "You'll never be out of it." I felt my throat closing again with the threat of tears. I couldn't tell if he looked happy or disgusted by the thought. "You occupy most of my thoughts. You're my first thought in the morning and last thought before I go to sleep. Sometimes I think about you being here with me."
His gaze moved to the empty side of the bed with a softness I hadn't seen in a long time. Could I have him back? "Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to have a crib set up in the corner of our bedroom." My hands began trembling in my lap. "I wonder if we would live in Twelve or Two. I wonder if we would watch our children running around in the field." Cato's momentarily soft face hardened as he met my eyes again. "But then I remember how I lost that possibility."
The nastiness in his voice came as a shock. My first tear fell as I stood from my chair without warning and turned away. I could see Cato jump slightly in the bed, probably afraid of what I might do. My throat was so tight it felt like it was choking me. I wanted to sit back in the chair and beg Cato to see things from my perspective, but being here was too hard. I was wrong to come here. I was almost to the door with tears running down my face when Cato spoke again.
"Aspen." I hesitated with my hand on the door handle as I wiped away my tears. "You should know that I don't completely hate you. The biggest part of me still loves you," Cato said.
I turned back to him. "There's a but in there somewhere," I whispered.
"But I don't trust that part. I don't trust that I'm genuinely in love with you," Cato said blankly.
"Well then... I hope that part of you can forgive me when this is all over," I said.
Cato nodded. "I'll work on it."
And so, without saying another word, I turned and left the room. I could hear him say anything else and I couldn't say anything more than I already had. He hated me and always would. I walked out of the room and closed the door behind me, pushing past the two guards who were waiting for me. They stared at me, looking like they wanted to ask what had happened, but I didn't give them a moment. I walked out of the hospital and into the armory, dropping against the floor and sobbing into my knees.
This was my final confirmation that I needed. He had officially told me that we were over. We didn't belong together. We weren't meant to be together, no matter how much either one of us wanted it. This was the end of my relationship with him. My sobs were almost hysterical as I shook from head to toe. It only lasted until I heard the ringing of the clocks, signaling that it was almost time for the shipment to leave. So, I took the necklace that my wedding ring rested on and ripped it off of my throat.
It broke my heart but I had to do it. I threw the ring overhanded across the armory away from me as I took my specialized bow and arrow off of the wall and turned to head into the hovercraft hangar. There were surprisingly few people lingering around. I ducked behind two sets of missile blocks that would be prepared for a later shipment. I briefly wondered what the Capitol would look like once Thirteen began its assault. There were thousands of weapons in here that Thirteen could use against our enemy.
I slipped through the few soldiers carefully, trying to ensure no one heard me. There was an announcement playing over the PA system with a warning that the next shipment of goods was leaving the hangar soon. I darted through the hangar to the open hovercraft. I ducked as I ran up the ramp and behind a stack of dried goods, pressing myself against the side of the plane panels. I'd made it there just in time. The rear deck of the plane rose as I took my spot. I let out a breath as I pressed my head back against the panels.
It was about a two-hour ride to the edge of the Capitol. I took the time to slip into my soldier uniform and tie my hair back. I put it in a ponytail rather than a braid in the hope that people didn't immediately recognize me. I needed to get to my team before being caught and shipped back to Thirteen. When the hovercraft dropped and the ramp opened, I walked out before any soldier could catch me. I kept my head down as I walked out but my hair and bow instantaneously gave me away. Faces turned to me within seconds.
"Hey, that's her," I heard one man say.
"That's Aspen Antaeus," a second man said.
There was a lot of scattered muttering as I walked further into the camp. I was terrified that I was about to be caught and put back on the plane to Thirteen when I felt a hand fall on my arm. "Hey," Gale greeted.
I breathed out in relief as I wrapped Gale in a hug. "Gale," I muttered.
"I didn't think you would make it," Katniss said, coming up to my other side.
"I said I'd be here, didn't I?" I teased her.
"I thought they said you weren't suited for active duty?" Gale asked.
"They did," I answered.
"Come on," Gale said.
The crowd that had gathered were all holding up my sign as Katniss and Gale pulled me toward the camp. I let out a deep breath nervously as I walked. I didn't manage to keep my appearance in the Capitol a secret for nearly as long as I'd meant to. I had thought that they would see me after a few hours, not after a few minutes. The crowd began to part as Katniss and Gale dragged me along with them. I gave them both a confident nod. This was the fight I had been looking forward to for so long.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 3 of The Hunger Games Retelling