The Black Widow | A Hunger Games Fanfiction

The Hovercraft

I bolted upright, sucking in a deep breath. I was in what looked like a hospital, but it couldn't be because the floor beneath me was moving. Rocking left and right as if we were on a boat.
District 4? I thought. Finnick had always talked about how he loved the rocking of the boats even though it made some people seasick. No, that wasn't right. I had been in the arena. I had been fighting Katniss and then lightning had struck. And Johanna, no.
No, not Johanna, she had been so alive. She couldn't be dead.
I ripped the tubes out of my arm and got to my feet. I felt wobbly. And then I felt a pain in the back of my neck. Sparking. Burning. Blackness.

Finnick was standing over me as I woke. He smiled when he saw me stirring. I checked around, Beetee was sitting beside him.
"What happened?" I asked. Finnick smiled pityingly,
"I think it's easier if Beetee explains." Beetee wheeled his chair over to me and began to talk in an annoying, know it all voice that sounded like he was trying to make it simpler or more bearable but it really wasn't working,
"The genetic engineering you underwent before your first games was done via a chip attatched to one of the vertebrae in your neck. It's a fairly simple science but risky when the chip ceases to work. When you were struck by the offshoots of the lightning, not only was your tracker fried, but also the chip. The heat from the electricity melded it to the vertebrae it was attatched to so now, not only will it randomly spark and cause you to pass out, but the removal process with the technology in thirteen would most likely paralyse you from the neck down."
"Thirteen?" I asked with hope, "does that mean we did it?" Finnick nodded but Beetee continued gravely.
"If we win this war, we would be able to use the resources of the Capitol to remove it, but no-one knows when or if that will happen so you have a decision to make: wait for an indefinite amount of time, passing out at random moments, or remove it and be paralysed."
"I'll wait," I said quickly, even though I could think of nothing worse than falling unconscious in a room full of strangers. It wasn't that I was paranoid, it was just that my past experiences had taught me not to trust anyone. The kind of experiences that teach you not to take drinks from strange men. But to be paralysed would be to be eternally helpless and I didn't want to think of what that would mean. Finnick placed his hand on my arm,
"It's okay, I'll look after you. We'll win this war and then we can fix it. You're going to be okay." I shot him a smile, then asked,
"You said the chip got rid of the genetic engineering. Does... does that mean I'm... me again?" He nodded, "Do you have a mirror?"

I spent the next half hour looking in the mirror and crying with joy. It felt that in losing the physical appearance that I had adopted for the Capitol, I was finally free. As if everything that had happened to me had happened to a different person.
My eyes had returned to their natural dark brown, my hair, which was back to being the same colour, fell in loose curls and my cheeks had filled out a bit more, losing the unnatural chiselled look. I couldn't even describe the delight I felt at finding that I once again had leg hair. And arm hair. And a little bit of hair over my upper lip.
I felt human again. For the first time in seven years, I felt human instead of some Capitol mutt.
I was free.

I decided to get up after that, and I walked out of the hospital-like room into a meeting room, where Finnick, Haymitch, Beetee and Plutarch were gathered around  table talking.
"We didn't manage to get Peeta and Johanna but four out of six isn't bad," Plutarch said,
"Katniss won't accept it," Haymitch pointed out, "She's unlikely to cooperate without the boy."
"What are you talking about?" I asked,
"Who was saved from the arena," Beetee answered, "We didn't manage to get Johanna or Peeta out."
"Johanna's alive?!" I exclaimed happily.
"Better dead than in the Capitol," Finnick said sullenly. I knew what he meant. But still, this meant that there was a chance to save Johanna. A chance that I could see her again. It was a selfish hope.
"Who was the last cannon for then?" I asked,
"Enobaria," Plutarch replied, "She ambushed Katniss and Johanna and Johanna managed to kill her while Katniss was trying to kill you. It meant she didn't have time to get her tracker out though." I nodded,
"And the victors in the Capitol," I probed, "Who did you get?"
"Disappointingly few," Haymitch said, "actually, none. It was just me."
"Did... did you see Cashmere before you left?" I asked, wondering what would happen to her. She had been there for me, protected me for years. I didn't know exactly what she was to me: friend, sister, mother, mentor? I had never wanted to lose her, but now, I guessed I already had. I had joined the rebels and left and she was still there.
"No," Haymitch replied, "But she's from District 1 and as far as we can tell, she's been unquestioningly loyal these past years."
"So was I," I said, "and now look at me. I want to go back for her." Haymitch shook his head,
"No can do kid." I was about to retort when Katniss burst in.
"Where's Peeta?" she cried. Poor girl, she didn't know. She would soon. I didn't want to listen.
I tuned her out like I had with years of Hunger Games as Haymitch and Finnick stopped her in her tracks, sedating her.

We arrived in District 13 not long after.