Hunger Games: Fandom Style

Insurgent (Part 2)

Author's Note: Procrastination, thy username is Drag0nst0rm.
Originally this was all going to be one chapter, but, to be perfectly honest, I didn't have time to finish it last night, so I chopped it into two bits. It might actually flow better this way in any case.
Sherlock can wait a bit longer, can't he?

The woods were quiet, save for a distant cry of a wolf.
That is not to say they were empty.
Twenty-five Rangers moved with a grace and silence that put shadows to shame. They stopped in a place in the forest that would have seemed unremarkable to anyone else.
Unless, of course, someone had stopped to wonder why so many stones had been placed so neatly there.
Twenty-five were there. One was in the Capital. An apprentice was in the arena.
The remaining twenty-four, and the apprentices they'd been training, lay beneath them. In the distance were the mentors of their youth, remnants that had survived the Dark Days. Those who had died in the Dark Days lay beyond even that.
Most held that the place was haunted. The Rangers encouraged the rumor with wind chimes and devices cooked up by Malcolm. It helped them hide what else was there.
Bows and arrows, of course. Their twin knives, naturally. These were the open secrets of their world that even the Peacekeepers ignored in the interest of keeping the Wargals and Kalkara away.
The guns were another matter. Not to mention the explosives. Best not to even mention the body armor. And really, the hovercraft was only a very small one, pieced together by scraps, duct tape, and prayer, nothing more.
The Rangers were silent. Their recruits were not.
"Horace, you big oaf, I thought you were a bear," Gilan said, clapping him on the back.
Horace didn't grin at him. He didn't have the energy for that. His eyes, however, did manage a faint gleam of amusement. "When I'm done with them, the Capital will think the same."
Gilan looked over the rest of the recruits. Fine, fine, bit young, but he'd do, fine, fine . . . "Alyss?"
"Yes?" she asked calmly.
He coughed a bit uncomfortably. "You're a girl."
"I believe I remember Will once saying something of the sort," she said agreeably.
Gilan searched for a way to say this tactfully. "Alyss, you know I mean no disrespect, but simply scientifically speaking -"
"A man will be just as dead if I pull the trigger. As I would be happy to demonstrate."
"You don't see Jenny here! There are other ways to help."
Alyss looked at him in astonishment. "What makes think Jenny needs the practice? She's been fighting with blunt instruments since she could walk!"
"Ladles don't count!"
"Gilan. How exactly do you propose to stop me?"
He looked in her eyes for a long moment, then nodded. "Right, men! And Alyss. Here's what we're going to do."

Gilan was all but safe when the Peacekeepers caught him breaking curfew.
"You, there! Stop!"
Gilan broke out running. He ducked down the first alleyway he came to and hurtled over a waist high wire fence. The Peacekeepers would be rounding the corner any moment. He slid soundlessly behind the high bushes that framed the back door of the house.
The Peacekeepers ran down the alleyway. "Do you see him?"
"Nothing." The older one sighed and huffed to a halt. "Don't bother. He was wearing one of those Ranger coats."
"So we can identify him in the morning?"
The older one laughed. "Sure. If you fancy waking up with an arrow in your throat the day after that."
The younger one's voice grew stern. "President Snow has given orders that we're to crack down on all these vigilante groups, sir."
The older one muttered something about Snow being welcome to come do that himself. Gilan grinned.
The younger one was less amused. "Sir - "
"I know, I know. We'll have to make an arrest or two."
"Orders are to take them all, sir."
"Seems a shame," he muttered absently. The younger one must have done something because he snapped. "Don't start. I'll do my duty. We'll get 'em. It'll cost us, but we'll get him." He paused. "Well, will you look at that. I think I know what our friend might have been up to." He walked closer. Gilan resisted the urge to look. Movement was far too dangerous. "Graffiti seems a bit petty for them, but what do I know? Come on. Shift's over." The sound of the boots faded down the alleyway.
Gilan waited a good ten minutes before daring to stir. He glanced at the wall he'd been hiding up against. He'd been to busy to get a good look earlier, but someone had indeed spray painted a message onto the wall.
"One arena, one ranger," he read. He smiled. "Well, I like the message, but they could have chosen a better place." Now that he looked around, he realized he was in Pauline's backyard, such as it was. By rights, she should have been at Halt's house in Victor's Village, but what with Snow's threats . . . He shook his head. That would change soon. They would get Will back, and Halt could have the family he'd lost.
Whoever it was that had wrote the message had started to outline it in blood red paint, but had evidently been interrupted, perhaps by the Peacekeeepers. Probably for the best. Gilan would have to come by later and offer to help Pauline wash it off.
Pauline herself peered out her back door. "Hello, Gilan," she said as if she were accustomed to meeting him back here at this time of night. "How are you?"
"Quite alright. Yourself?"
The lines around her face had deepened, but she nodded tightly. "I'll be all right, I think, but I wish Will wouldn't scare me like that. Halt was like that in his own Games you know. Always at the edge of disaster." She smiled fondly. "Can I help you with anything?"
"Actually, I was just about to ask you the same." He nodded towards her wall.
She stepped outside to look at it. "Oh, no, thank you, but you're a dear for asking. I think I'm just about done." She raised a can of red spray paint. "Should I add an oakleaf, do you think?"