accidentalrebellion | Exsilium; IC contact

[ That tone is enough to undo him; it's everything he hates, whatever would make a person feel that way - would make Katniss, the strongest person he knows, feel that way. But of course, the Capitol is sneaky. The Capitol is clever. The Capitol knows how to steal peoples' voices and use them, twist them, as all of the tributes saw in the Quarter Quell. As all of Panem saw, of course.

As a reminder to the rebels that even the strongest among them cannot overcome the power of the Capitol.

No, maybe the strongest among them couldn't - there's him, Johanna, and whoever else was picked up to attest to that. But there's also Katniss, the mockingjay who survived not once but twice, living proof that the strongest among the rebels can still give the Capitol a slap in the face. Not without retaliation, no, but there's a certain pleasure in knowing that she's out there somewhere beyond their reach - as she must be, because he's not so naive as to think he'd be kept alive if she weren't, not with his complete inability to tell them anything of the rebellion and face not so loved as hers among the people. He's certainly not so naive as to think he'd be used against Haymitch, who proved so spectacularly that he only plays for his own side. His family is nothing to the Capitol. So - it's clear.

He may be a lot of things, but Peeta Mellark is a Victor of the Seventy-fourth Hunger Games, and that means he too knows how to survive. There's nothing but relentlessness when he speaks, almost harsh. ]

That's not an answer.

[For everything that's familiar about that voice, there's something that distinctly isn't. Maybe she'd picked up a hint of it initially, but in her shock and her need to confirm, it could've easily become lost under other priorities. But now it's unavoidable. It pierces her like a spear, stings her in a way that almost nothing ever has, in a way that hurts so much it can't be anything but real.

Harshness.

This isn't right. Not directed at her, at any rate. It should be the steady gentleness she knows best, the kind of steadiness she could hold onto when there was nothing else. What managed to keep her nightmares at bay those nights on the train and those nights before the Quell. What she hasn't had in what seems like so long.

(What she needs.)

A breath becomes stuck in her throat, making it even harder to think, to work through this with facts and treat it like the hallucination it probably is, much less to speak. It takes a few long moments before she's able to choke out another equally quiet response.]

It's me.

[ He's quiet for a long moment. He wants to believe it's Katniss -

- but that's exactly what the Capitol would want -

- maybe it's worth the risk -

- because just surviving isn't everything. It costs much more than your life, it takes everything you are, but there's no point in staying alive if they just become pieces, people still alive but directionless and without anything to hold onto. Not even people at all anymore by then.

(Go on then, Lover Boy.) ]

The first time I showed you my paintings. Do you remember? What did you think of them?

[ What he needs is something they haven't said on cameras, something private, something reasonably safe. ]

[She remembers. It seems like a million years ago by now. Back when there was only a Victory Tour, a show to put on, a president to convince. Back when she never dreamed she'd be thrown into the arena again. Before a spark exploded into a flame that bred chaos, that leveled an entire district to ruins. Before all that was left of her home were the ashes that stuck in the treads of her shoes.

Comparatively, things were simpler.

No one but Peeta would bring up something like that, right? They were alone. Away from the cameras, away from the charade. But Snow has his eyes everywhere; he's proven that time and time again. There's nothing to say that there haven't been others. Nothing to say that someone can't and won't use any means against her, anything to undo her. The jabberjays, after all, are still a fresh wound.

Nevertheless, after a time:]

I hated them. [And then, because she feels like she needs to add something, even if the words might still be hard to get out:] They brought my nightmares to life.

[ He closes his eyes.

No, there's no guarantee that those words had been safe, not overheard. A Capitol train full of Capitol people, how could it ever be untapped? Snow had hated them then too, had been suspicious of their "love story," had threatened Katniss and indirectly him too if they couldn't pull off the charade, quell the rebellion in the districts. But he'd imagine even a Capitol flunky would've assumed she'd seen them sooner, or that she'd been more complimentary like everyone else had been, or at least hadn't said something so blunt like hating them. Could a product of the Capitol understand the feelings of a tribute when faced with reminders of their own arenas, fake it so convincingly?

Maybe. ]

When did you find out you were pregnant?

[ The Capitol, Snow - surely they'd think she was in on it from much earlier, if she really weren't pregnant. ]

[That particular question is treading dangerous waters. In the immediate moment, her eyes widen, and she's unsure of what to do, how to react. Like the proverbial camera has shifted its focus, spotlighting her on that stage for all of Panem to see. Every twitch, every last detail of her face exposed and magnified, the very definition of vulnerable as what could be the key to succeeding in her mission hinges on her reaction.

Thus far, she hasn't been handling this well. If someone's watching, if this is a game, then she's not going to give them the satisfaction. Now, just like then, she'll keep up the necessary appearances. She'll do her best to add a little more strength to her voice.]

At the interview.

[She's not flat-out calling it a lie over the network, in case it's somehow still needed. (Over time, she's gotten slightly better at playing this game.) But if that's the real Peeta, he can read between the lines.]

[ The first thing he does is breathe out.

He could be wrong. This might not be her, might be another trap from the Capitol, some ploy to get information out of him or make him suffer; but she knows the right things, reacts in the right ways, and right now that's good enough. What'll come will come. ]

Katniss.

[ He says, and it's relieved and - wondering, because this is impossible, and he'd already known that odds of seeing her again were slim now, the odds of even hearing her voice like this so soon down to nothing. But he knows too that he should find some way to identify himself, let her be sure, because she must be thinking of all the same concerns he is.

He laughs a little despite himself, shakily. ]

I guess this time I do have something I need to apologize for.

[She's been trying so hard. Trying so hard to hold it together, to not let herself be so easily ensnared into a trap. To be as strong as she has no choice but to be.

But when she hears her name, spoken in just the way she knows, in that way that's so irrevocably Peeta, it's all over.

About a thousand different emotions, all messy, muddled, and indecipherable, begin to overwhelm her. Blips of things that are recognizable (automatic relief, equally automatic and suffocating guilt) surface for brief instances before blending in to the mass once more, over and over in a cycle that consumes all else. Thought. Breath.

It's another few long moments before she finally manages to say something.]

No. [She takes a pause to swallow down the lump in her throat.] You don't.

[I do]

[ There's sadness that'll come, anger, guilt, plenty of flavors of negativity just waiting on the brink - but for now, for now, for now - ]

I want to see you.

[ More than see, but one step at a time ]

[Maybe this is a mistake. The fatal one. The one that will finally eliminate the Girl on Fire, the Mockingjay, the Capitol's public enemy number one. That will take care of Snow's greatest nuisance without him even having to lift a finger. Quick, easy. Efficient.

But she wants (needs) to see Peeta just as much. She needs that final piece of confirmation, no matter what the potential risks could be. She needs to know that he's real.

There's only one relevant question.]

Where are you?

[ He provides his location, somewhere not far off from the transport apartments, and waits. He's not armed - whatever that woman might have said, a pack of colored pencils doesn't make him armed, and nor do playing cards or a Capitol-like communication contraption. Even if he was being treated well - surprisingly well, in fact, enough to keep his nerves on edge - by the Capitol, there's no way he'd be allowed to keep a weapon with him. The place at which he was basically under house arrest had been carefully stripped of sharp objects, with things like utensils replaced with less dangerous plastic counterparts. He couldn't help but think it was as much to ensure that he didn't try to kill himself as much as that he couldn't attack anyone else (and that was - something he'd thought about, it's true). The necklace he'd worn as token in the last Games had been gone by the time he'd woken up in Capitol custody, and he'd known it'd be useless to ask after it.

He waits quietly, with the air of one at ease even if the line between his shoulders is tense, and he watches his surroundings for signs of movement. ]

[By now, she has a fairly extensive mental map of the area, at least within a few-mile radius. There's nothing to do, nothing to keep her sane, but to wander. Every morning, she rises as early as she always has (not that she ever sleeps much; her nightmares are worse than they've ever been) and sets off, bow and quiver of arrows slung over her shoulder. She never finds much of anything, but at least her thoughts can be kept at bay while her restless feet have something to occupy them.

So she knows exactly where he's described.

After a time, she approaches with quiet steps, her senses as alert as they'd be on a hunt as she scans her surroundings. Just in case, her bow is directly in her hand instead of over her shoulder, ready to be placed into a defensive position at a moment's notice. (People like them, survivors like them, know to be ready for anything.)

She isn't ready, though, for spotting what she's been looking for. Immediately, she stops in her tracks, unable to do much of anything apart from let out a very audible gasp, one that would obviously give her away anywhere. In a setting that's still so strange, there's one thing that jumps out as familiar. Achingly so.

Unless she's hallucinating, it's him. Really him. Not on a television screen, not a product of the thoughts that continually haunt her, but existing in the flesh, standing just a small distance away.]

[ He turns to look when he hears the gasp, maybe a little too sharply - and when he sees her, he stills, expression going blank with surprise for a second. It's very different to hear her voice - maybe her voice, probably her voice, easily could be a fake even if she knows things only she should know - and to see her, to know she's only a matter of feet away, as if they're still in District 12 or the arena before everything went wrong (and who's to say this isn't another arena?). The way she holds her bow is no less than he'd expect of her, lending credibility to the thought that it really might be her. It really might be that somehow he and the girl on fire both got brought to this strange strange place, where there are a thousand new dangers and where they can be together.

(Or, if this is some kind of a trick or hallucination, maybe he can't bring himself to care anymore.)

He doesn't run at her or anything, but he does take a few steps forward, a bit cautious of that bow among other things. ]

[In one moment, time stops.

The bow slips unceremoniously from her fingers and onto the ground without an attempt to stop it. That gasp was her last; now, she can barely breathe at all. Her awareness, normally so in tune with everything around her, ready for anything, hones in on just one thing and shuts the rest of the world out. It's dangerous, dangerous because a whole army of mutts could line up behind her back for an attack, and she wouldn't even know. Wouldn't even know if the entire world was burning to ash in her midst.

In the next moment, it's nothing but certain. The intricate impossibilities of the hows and the whys don't matter. Not now, anyway. All that matters is the irrefutable evidence of what is.

There's only one thing to do.

Without preamble, without so much as a second thought, she closes the remaining distance between them at a run, and throws her arms around his neck when she does.]

[ He has his arms out already, wraps them around her as she crashes into him. And with that crash comes something else breaking, three months of smothered fear and worry splintering under the warmth and weight of her presence. Her presence. Katniss Everdeen, girl on fire, the girl from the Seam he admired from afar for years before getting noticed by her in the most terrible of circumstances; the girl who didn't let him die in the mud or the caves, risked her life for his, later became a co-conspirator, a fiancee, a "mother," a Mockingjay, but -

- it's just, it's a lot of fancy names for the girl he holds right now, as tightly as he's able because who would've thought this would be possible, a girl who at the end of the day is just Katniss. He kisses the top of her head, doesn't bother pulling away to look at her because there'll be plenty of time for that later. ]

I missed you. [he admits. ]

Edited 2012-11-30 19:40 (UTC)

[Until now, she's never considered the possibility of this. Seeing him again. Hearing his voice in her ear. Feeling the comforting warmth of his arms around her, the same warmth that got her through so many nights, so many horrors in that arena. No, she could never have afforded to consider it. Even if he wasn't dead, even if she'd keep fighting hard to keep him alive, there was never a guarantee of how long that'd last. ...

But the boy with the bread has not yet slipped away.

She feels something start to break inside of her. A thin thread solely responsible for holding her together, for preventing her from coming apart at the seams, slowly begins to unravel. The wall, the pillar of all her pseudo-strength, threatens to crash to the ground and crumble to dust. She tries for a steadying breath, but there's a profound hitch in it she can't suppress. There's something stinging in her eyes that's not easily blinked back.

There are no words with which to respond, even if she weren't disadvantaged in that area already. Maybe in another lifetime, such an admission would've garnered a much different response out of her; a rolling of the eyes, that old stab of guilt and awfulness whenever he alluded to anything sentimental. But now, it just causes her to cling to him more tightly, as tightly as she possibly can. To shut out the world around her for a while.

She won't be the first to let go.]

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action! also wow sorry i am slowy mcslowpants

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