Spark to Flame: A Finniss Story

Pt II: Wave to Ripple

They're halfway to the beach when Katniss feels a tug on the coil.

She looks behind them, afraid that it got caught on one of the boulders littered throughout the trail they've been following, but is unable to pinpoint the source. And then it tugs again. Her eyes follow the jiggling wire to a spot behind a particularly large rock, and she has just enough time to register that something's horribly wrong before the line snaps completely and Brutus emerges from his hiding place behind the rocks.

Terror strikes her nerves and she readies her bow to defend herself, unsuspecting of the brutal blow to the head Johanna gives her with the coil from behind. The bow falls from her hands and she's knocked to the ground, vision blurring so much that she can hardly even make out the figure of the District 7 woman leaning over her. She feels a sharp pain a beat later, and she screams in agony as her right arm is torn open by a cold metal blade.

The tracker that the Capitol had given her is gruesomely carved out of her skin, and she's in such shock that this is happening to her that she can't even force herself to try and get away. Something warm and metallic is spread across her neck, and she vaguely recognizes it to be her own blood. She closes her eyes and accepts her fate as she braces herself for the final blow, but it never comes; instead, someone leans down and whispers harshly in her ear.

"Stay. Put."

It's Johanna's voice, but she can't seem to process the meaning of her words as she lays there with her arm cut open and her blood smeared all over her neck. She's gone a moment later, and she hears the rustling of grass and leaves as she runs away, Brutus and Enobaria following swiftly behind her.

She gets up as soon as she deems it's safe, shock jolting her backwards and into a wall of dirt as someone else's voice comes bursting through the night air.

"Johanna?! Katniss?!"

It's Finnick, she realizes, and he's looking for her.

She almost steps out from underneath the overhang she's flattened herself against to show herself to the man standing above her, but stops herself from doing anything of the sort when everything suddenly clicks in her brain; this was all planned. They wanted to split them up, to get Peeta and her alone. Then they could easily finish them off after dealing with the Careers. Finnick and Johanna were obviously well acquainted, and it would only make sense for them to befriend Wiress and Beetee, whose brains were worth more than her wedding dress. She and Peeta were the outsiders, the expendables. And all that time Finnick had been trying to get close to her...it was all a trick. It was all a trick and she almost fell for it...

Tears sting at her eyes and the dam in her nose loosens, and she has to put a hand over her mouth to keep from making a strangled squeak of pain. Blood trickles down her arm and it feels like a rock has lodged itself in her throat, making it painful to swallow, but she hardly notices these things; she's too focused on muffling her cries and keeping hidden from Finnick.

It seems to take forever, but eventually she hears the continuous beat of his retreating footsteps, and in that moment she breaks.

She lurches off the dirt wall and stumbles unsteadily forward on her feet, head swelling with lightness as she struggles to keep her balance. She breathes heavily, hot tears streaming down her face as the reality of her situation hits her with full force, and she has to struggle to control her breathing as she begins to hyperventilate.

She heaves, breaths coming in sudden, uneven gasps, and she breaks down crying right then and there. To think that she had almost fallen for the Capitol's number one player, to think that he had actually cared for her...her stomach drops with the speed of a raging bullet, and her tears immediately cease as she remembers: Peeta. Peeta is still at the tree. Not with her.