Spark to Flame: A Finniss Story

Pt III: Tremor to Quake

Life in District 13 is very bland.

Or so Finnick comes to learn.

There is next to nothing to do there, no television to watch or expensive toys to mess with - not even a group of cheeky old ladies to entertain. All the people he came into contact with were boring and dull, cookie-cutter men and women in faded brown jumpsuits that couldn't be told apart from one another, let alone bothered to entertain a bored Victor; it was sad, really.

Coin had forbade him from doing any actual work, saying that the citizens of District 13 could handle any laborious tasks that needed done on their own and that, as an asset, he needed to be protected from any possible harm. Needless to say, he didn't bother asking if he could go outside; God forbid if he wanted some vitamin D or a breath of fresh air.

So, with nowhere to be and nothing else to do, he explored. After all, with an underground facility containing forty different levels (or something or other) he was bound to find something interesting. And so he hopped onto the first elevator he could find, and began his journey across the first floor.

~*~

He overhears the most interesting things as he walks, passing the district natives who seem to have plenty of down-time for people who had been described as 'very busy' by President Coin. He learns that no one much cares for Effie Trinket, that Prim is an exceptional assistant at the hospital, and that Katniss has been taken to District 12 to see what had become of it - apparently she had refused to become Coin's Mockingjay, and Plutarch had convinced her to let the distraught teen visit the remaining ashes of her old home in hopes of changing her mind.

He was angry when he had first heard this, furious, even; what did they honestly hope to accomplish by allowing her to set foot in her old district, to stain her eyes with the images of demolished buildings and the lifeless bodies of people she used to know? And why hadn't he been told such a decision had been made in the first place? Didn't they know that it would only damage her further? That it could only prove to pull her deeper into insanity?

Rage sparked inside him, and he just barely stopped himself from marching right up to Coin and reprimanding her poor judgment. It took him a while, but his overly emotional state eventually subsided for something more rational, for which he was all too thankful.

Okay, just calm down, he told himself. This was Katniss he was talking about. The girl who had lit the world on fire with nothing but a designer dress and some cheap flames. She had been to Hell and back twice, and survived. She could handle impossible odds, and had done so many times. Why should he be worried about what a short trip to her home district would do to her?

Oh, the things we learn from our travels. So bothersome. He should have just stayed in his hospital bed all day and hit on the bitchy nurse that brought him food every two hours. It would have certainly beat worrying himself to death over whether or not the girl he had sworn to protect had delved further into madness.

What should he expect when she got back? If she got back? He was so foolish. He should have kept a better eye on her. He had thought it best to give her her space but he saw now that that was the last thing he should be doing; damned girl couldn't keep her feet planted in one place if she tried.

He decides in the end to do nothing, telling himself that calling Coin or Plutarch out on their reckless behavior regarding Katniss' whereabouts and mental state would do little to help her now, seeing as she was probably already looking at the atrocities the Capitol had committed this very second, and that she'll probably come out a stronger person because of it, maybe even agree to help them take down Snow.