The Perfect Truth: A Finnick Odair Novel

Chapter 3

A/N: hello i'm actually not dead i'll have yall know

Warnings: swearing, violence, death, blood, all that shit you see in filler chapters

Word count: 1158

Recap:

I can't help it, I sink back into his arms with a sigh, tilting my head back to rest it against his collarbone.

'Changed your mind about pushing me away, Everdeen?' He chuckles.

'Shut up, Finn,' I mutter, enjoying the feel of his arms around me. He brushes a hand through my hair, and I decide that I'd better make the most of it before I have to kill him. In my left ear, I hear his soft laugh, but it's the one he uses to capture women, not the real one I've heard only once or twice. It unsettles me enough for it to cause me to pull away from him, and I glance over when I feel a few pairs of eyes on me. It's the Career tributes. And the way they glare tells me I'm the first to die.

Chapter 3

Finnick, most definitely used to hostile people, deftly forms a noose and catches my attention by pretending to hang himself, presumably for my own amusement. He holds out the long end of the rope.

'Want to take me for a walk?'

I roll my eyes. 'Only if it's away from me, which I doubt it will be, since I'm the one who'd be walking you. So, if you'll excuse me, I was instructed to make friends with people other than you.' I head over to the station where tributes can learn to build fires. I can build one pretty well, but I rely on matches too much, so I have a go with the flint and steel. There are the two tributes from District Three there, and I talk to them. The woman is called Wiress, and she's around the same age as my mother, but doesn't look anything like her, which I guess is a small mercy. The man is called Beetee, and he has heavy, metal rimmed glasses, which I can imagine as a fucking nightmare in the Games.

Wiress glances over to where the Gamemakers are eating and drinking. She inclines her head at them.

'Can you see? By the corner of...' She trails off, which seems to be a common occurrence, and leaves Beetee to finish.

'The corner of the table.'

I squint and make out a small square of rippling air.

'What is it?' I ask.

'It's a force field,' Beetee says. 'All force fields have it.'

I nod, storing away the information. Glancing over at Peeta, I can tell he's definitely been making friends by the way he stands by a bunch of tributes, laughing and gesturing like he's always belonged. If they weren't murderers like me, I'd almost be jealous.

When we go for lunch, the tributes push the tables together, and Peeta beckons. Grudgingly, I skulk over and eat my lunch surrounded by the other victors.

'How's it going?' He asks me.

'Fine,' I sigh. 'I like the District 3 victors. Wiress and Beetee.'

'Really?' He asks. 'They're a bit of a joke to the others. Johanna has nicknamed them Nuts and Volts. I think she's Nuts and he's Volts.'

I shrug. 'They're smart. We need that.' I pause, then reluctantly add, 'And we won't need any more muscle if Finnick joins us.'

~

Later, after lunch, I pick up some fishing techniques, which I'll need if the water is too fast for me to shoot fish, or if the fish are too small. Finnick appears, but just to introduce me to an elderly woman called Mags, to my immense relief. He looks at Mags with this sort of reverence, and doesn't dare flirt, so I assume I'm safe from his 'charm' in her presence. She's amazing at making fish hooks, but her District Four accent is hard to understand, even though I'm used to it because of Finn, and the fact that she has less than half her teeth left doesn't really help either. I find myself liking her anyway, and smile to myself. Great. So I want an old woman and two half crazy inventors. Haymitch will love that. More like throw a fit and drown himself in alcohol. Deluded man - although I can't really talk. Sighing, I give up entirely and go to the archery range, my favourite. If you saw Kat and I using our bows, you'd think that we were dopplegangers, if she was a little taller and even more grumpy than she already is.

As soon as the trainer in charge of the archery station realises that standing targets are easy pickings for me, he starts chucking these little birds into the air for me to hit. It's more fun, way more, and I like the challenge when he starts throwing up multiple birds. When I start hitting at least five in one round consistently, I realise you can hear each one hit the ground. Glancing around, I see the victors all gaping, their faces a mix of hatred, envy and admiration. Even Peeta. And apart from Finnick, who just leans against the wall with his insufferable smirk on. Like he knew that I could shoot like that. Probably because he does. No doubt about that, actually. Slowly, I set down the bow and thank the trainer. He smiles, and I look each victor in the eyes, skipping over Finnick, then call for Peeta. Obediently, he follows me as I walk out the door, making my statement very clear. If any of them tries to kill Peeta, they'll find themselves like the fake birds littering the floor, an arrow in each of their hearts.

~

Haymitch looks at me curiously when I arrive for dinner.

'How did you make so many tributes want you as an ally?'

I laugh. 'Just the normal.'

Peeta explains. 'She shot. For real. It was amazing.'

I snort. 'Amazing.' I spit. 'I did that almost five times a week for the last ten years just to keep myself and my family alive. Back home I'd be punished for that. But here they don't care. I'll be killed anyway.'

~

I spend the next week with almost all the tributes. Even the drug - crazed morphlings. And I exchange archery lessons for trident throwing lessons with Finnick. I glance up as Peeta walks in, rousing me from my thoughts.

'You figured out what you're going to do for the Gamemakers?'

'No. Don't care, maybe make some fish hooks. How about you?'

'No idea. I wish I could bake a cake for them.'

I laugh. 'Do camouflage. You're good at it, oh son of a baker.'

'If the morphlings leave me anything left to work with,' he replies wryly. 'They love that station.'

I sigh and rake a hand through my hair. 'I don't know how I'm going to kill these people.'

'Peeta!' Haymitch yells. 'It's your turn!'

Obediently, he goes in. And he's in there. For half an hour. More. After around forty minutes, he comes out, and I wonder what he's done. After I take one look at the Gamemakers' bewildered faces, I only know that whatever I do will have to be even more shocking than what he did. I need to save him, for Kat's sake. So I stride in. Make a noose, just like Finnick did. But, unlike him, I do not ask them if they want to take me for a walk. I put it around a dummy's neck and hang it. This gets their attention. And while it does, I go over to the camouflage station and pick out a container of blood red berry juice. Take it over to the dummy. And paint the name of the now dead man, killed because of the berries that Kat pulled out, so she could save Peeta and herself. Stepping back, I watch as the Gamemakers' faces go slack as they read the name of their old leader.

Seneca Crane.