Reunited // Finnick Odair

Chapter 38

- Finnick's P.O.V -

Katniss came and sat by me and told me her what she think Snow is planning with Peeta. But I already know. I know because he is doing the same thing with Anna. He's known for a long time about Anna and I - since we were children and the day he visited her house and subsequently took her away. From the people who loved her to a new family far away. He could see that we were meant to stay together. So he took twisted pleasure in tearing us apart. It worked in his favour that Anna forgot about me, and why should she remember? She went through something traumatic at a young age.

But I never forgot her. And when I saw her again on that television screen, being chosen as Tribute, I could hardly believe it. I didn't know if it was simple coincidence, or whether it was a cruel joke of Snow to torment me further. He already had me find out his secrets within the Capitol - was Anna being chosen as Tribute another way to hurt me? But it did and he saw every day how it killed me to see her go through it. And when she won and had to tour around the Capitol - I was always kept busy, always kept away until he could no longer keep me away from her.

But now she is once again in his clutches to be used as a weapon against me. Against my heart and my sanity. And what of hers? Another traumatic experience - even more so than before at an age where she can fully comprehend it. What form of torture is he subjecting her to? It was so uncertain as to whether I would ever see her again (though I remained hopeful for both of our sanity's sake) or whether so would even remember me? Could he really be that cruel to make her forget me a second time? The answer, of course, is yes. Because I refuse to believe that there is any shred of humanity within that snake of a man and that he will stop at nothing to find ways to rip someone apart. And Anna is the way, for me. He'll do anything, never relenting. Whatever it takes to break you.

"This is what they're doing to you with Vivianna, isn't it?" Katniss asks me.

"Yes," I simply reply.

"Oh, Finnick. I'm so sorry."

"No, I'm sorry. That I didn't warn you somehow," I tell her.

"You did warn me though. On the hovercraft. Only when you said they'd use Peeta against me, I thought you meant like bait. To lure me into the Capitol somehow," she says.

I shake my head. "I shouldn't have said even that. It was too late for it to be of any help to you. Since I hadn't warned you before the Quarter Quell, I should've shut up about how Snow operates." I yank on the end of my rope, and an intricate knot becomes a straight line again. My hands are red and raw but it's my anchor. "It's just that I didn't understand when I met you. After your first Games, I thought the whole romance was an act on your part. We all expected you'd continue that strategy. But it wasn't until Peeta hit the force field and nearly died that I--" I hesitate.

"That you what?"

"That I knew I'd misjudged you. That you do love him. I'm not saying in what way. Maybe you don't know yourself. But anyone paying attention could see how much you care about him," I tell her gently.

Katniss and I sit for a long time in silence, watching the knots bloom and vanish, before Katniss asks,"How do you bear it?"

I look at her incredulously. "I don't, Katniss! Obviously, I don't. I drag myself out of nightmares each morning and find there's no relief in waking." Something in her expression stops me. "Better not to give in to it. It takes ten times as long to put yourself back together as it does to fall apart. The more you can distract yourself, the better," I say.

I mess with the rope again and then sigh. "First thing tomorrow, we'll get you your own rope. Until then, take mine." I hand it to her and she accepts it gratefully, bidding me goodbye, for now, and goes back to her own bed.

~

- Vivianna's P.O.V -

"Sit," I'm pushed down into the chair in front of an ornate desk by two Peacekeepers before they step back and stand guard behind me. I'm aware that I am in Snow's office or study of sorts. The desk is cluttered but in an orderly way and the chair behind it is unoccupied for the time being. I fiddle with my fingers, picking at my nails - a new habit of mine. Another thing Effie would scold me for. They were already dirtied with dried blood and dirt and now shorter than ever before. But I didn't care. It was a distraction.

The door opens and I don't watch Snow enter and only lift my head to look at him when he sits down on the opposite side of the desk and leans forwards. "Leave us," he orders the Peacekeepers and they swiftly march out and close the doors, but probably remain behind it in case I attempt an escape.

"Hello, Miss Everly," he says as always when we meet. I don't reply just look at him blankly for a few seconds before looking away. He had a smear of blood on his cheek, probably from Peeta or Johanna - but after the events of the interview and how it was disrupted into chaos, my guess was with Peeta. I wasn't beaten any further afterwards like I imagine he was, but I figured this way my form of punishment.

"Aren't you going to greet me?" Snow continues and leans back in his chair, linking his hands together. "Say hello? Ask about my well-being?"

"Why am I here?" I ask instead.

He chuckles. "No nonsense, as ever. Well, Miss Everly, there is something I want from you. You have something I need."

I frown. "What is it?"

A smirk plays at his puffy lips. "A simple token. But, if you struggle to comply, there will be punishment, as usual. We would rather not resort to such...extremities--" I laugh out loud bitterly at the irony. "But I assure you I will if you fail to comply."

"What is it?" I repeat and he grins.
~

- Finnick's P.O.V -

Cressida has the idea to film Katniss in front of the ruins of the old Justice Building, which is something of a joke since the Capitol's been using it as a backdrop for fake news broadcasts for years (something Katniss had told me earlier), to show that the district no longer existed. Now, with the recent attack, the Justice Building sits about ten yards away from the edge of a new crater. As we approach what used to be the grand entrance, Gale points out something and the whole party slows down. I don't know what the problem is at first and then I see the ground strewn with fresh pink and red roses. Sat atop a small hill is a parachute - one of the ones used in the Games.

"Don't touch them!" Katniss yells. "They're for me!"

The sickeningly sweet smell hits my nose, and my head swims. Katniss explains to us as best I can the significance of the roses. Upon inspection, they appear to be harmless, if genetically enhanced, flowers. Two dozen roses. Slightly wilted. Most likely dropped after the last bombing. A crew in special suits collects them and carts them away. They pick up the parachute and read a small tag that's been attached to it. And then they look at me and hand it over before leaving.

I frown and check the tag. Finnick Odair. I glance up and see Katniss getting into place, Cressida ordering her around and telling her the lines. I give her a thumbs-up as I turn the parachute over and over before I open it and almost drop it. I pull the contents out and let the container crash to the ground. Inside was one of the worst things I could've been sent: Anna's tokens.

The trident bracelet I had given her for her birthday. The one that signified friendship and where she came from and that I was always going to be a part of her life, no matter where she went or who she was with, I was always to remain her friends.

The wave bangle I gave to her before the Quarter Quell - a way of showing her that I would love her eternally and that she, to me, is as beautiful as the waves in District 4 that we used to run in when we were little. A symbol of hope and a promise that she was mine and I was hers.

The sound of Katniss sobbing makes me look up and focus myself.

"What's wrong with her?" Plutarch asks under his breath.

"She's figured out how Snow's using Peeta," I say. I glance down at the bracelets before slipping them on. A sly tear slips down my cheek as I realise Snow has found a way to break me even further. I didn't know if this was all that was left of her, if she was alive or dead or somewhere in the middle.

I look up again just as a needle is injected into Katniss and she falls unconscious. And then I lose it.

~

I wake up in a hospital bed with Katniss standing over me. I sit up and she tells me the best news I could've heard. A rescue mission - for Peeta, for Johanna, for Vivianna. "Don't you see, Katniss, this will decide things. One way or the other. By the end of the day, they'll either be dead or with us. It's...it's more than we could hope for!"

The torment finally at an end. The curtain yanks back and there's Haymitch. He has a job for us, if we can pull it together. They still need post-bombing footage of 13. "If we can get it in the next few hours, Beetee can air it leading up to the rescue, and maybe keep the Capitol's attention elsewhere."

"Yes, a distraction," I nod. "A decoy of sorts."

"What we really need is something so riveting that even President Snow won't be able to tear himself away. Got anything like that?" asks Haymitch.

~

When the television crew's all assembled aboveground, Katniss asks Cressida if she could start out by asking her about Peeta. She takes a seat on the fallen marble pillar where she had her breakdown, waits for the red light and Cressida's question.

"How did you meet Peeta?" she asks. And then she does the thing that I know Haymitch has wanted since her first interview. She opens up. "When I met Peeta, I was eleven years old, and I was almost dead." She talks about one day when she tried to sell baby clothes in the rain, and how Peeta's mother chased her from the bakery door, and how he took a beating to bring her the burnt loaves of bread that saved her life. I had never heard this story before and it put mine and Anna's - simply meeting on a beach - to shame. "We had never even spoken. The first time I ever talked to Peeta was on the train to the Games."

"But he was already in love with you," says Cressida.

"I guess so." She allows herself a small smile that makes me smile. I like Katniss, she's become a close ally in all of this.

"How are you doing with the separation?" Cressida asks.

"Not well. I know at any moment Snow could kill him. Especially since he warned Thirteen about the bombing. It's a terrible thing to live with," she says and I laugh internally in agreement. "But because of what they're putting him through, I don't have any reservations anymore. About doing whatever it takes to destroy the Capitol. I'm finally free." She turns her gaze skyward. "President Snow once admitted to me that the Capitol was fragile. At the time, I didn't know what he meant. It was hard to see clearly because I was so afraid. Now I'm not. The Capitol's fragile because it depends on the districts for everything. Food, energy, even the Peacekeepers that police us. If we declare our freedom, the Capitol collapses. President Snow, thanks to you, I'm officially declaring mine today."

Katniss's message to President Snow gets the wheels spinning in Plutarch's brain. He hastily calls me and Haymitch over and we have a brief but intense conversation that I can see Haymitch isn't happy with. And maybe I'm not either. Plutarch wins me over though and I can feel myself pale but I nod my head at the end. It has to be done.

As I move to take my seat before the camera, Haymitch tells me, "You don't have to do this."

"Yes, I do. If it will help her." I balls up his rope in my hand. "I'm ready."

I take a deep breath as Cressida signals me. "President Snow used to...sell me...my body, that is," I begin in a flat, removed tone. "I wasn't the only one. If a victor is considered desirable, the president gives them as a reward or allows people to buy them for an exorbitant amount of money. If you refuse, he kills someone you love. So you do it. I wasn't the only one, but I was the most popular. And perhaps the most defenseless, because the people I loved were so defenseless. To make themselves feel better, my patrons would make presents of money or jewelry, but I found a much more valuable form of payment." I paused. "Secrets. And this is where you're going to want to stay tuned, President Snow, because so very many of them were about you. But let's begin with some of the others."

I begin to weave a tapestry so rich in detail that no one would doubt its authenticity - and it was all entirely true. Tales of strange sexual appetites, betrayals of the heart, bottomless greed, and bloody power plays. Drunken secrets whispered over damp pillow-cases in the dead of night. I was someone bought and sold. A district slave. A handsome one, so I believed, but in reality, I was harmless. Who could I tell? Anna was away from me. And who would believe me if I did? But some secrets are too delicious not to share. I begin to reel off names - all of them prominent Capitol citizens. If a bad haircut can lead to hours of gossip, what will charges of incest, back-stabbing, blackmail, and arson produce? Even as the waves of shock and recrimination roll over the Capitol, the people there will be waiting to hear about the president. And I would give it them.

"And now, on to our good President Coriolanus Snow," I say. "Such a young man when he rose to power. Such a clever one to keep it. How, you must ask yourself, did he do it? One word. That's all you really need to know. Poison."I goes back to Snow's political ascension and I work my way up to the present, pointing out case after case of the mysterious deaths of Snow's adversaries or, even worse, his allies who had the potential to become threats. People dropping dead at a feast or slowly, inexplicably declining into shadows over a period of months. Blamed on bad shellfish, elusive viruses, or an overlooked weakness in the aorta. Snow drinking from the poisoned cup himself to deflect suspicion. But antidotes don't always work. They say that's why he wears the roses that reek of perfume. They say it's to cover the scent of blood from the mouth sores that will never heal. They say, they say, they say...Snow has a list and no one knows who will be next.

Poison. The perfect weapon for a snake. My words seem to have a profound effect on the displaced Capitol rebels like Katniss's crew and Fulvia - even Plutarch occasionally reacts in surprise, maybe wondering how a specific tidbit passed him by. When I finish, they just keep the cameras rolling until finally I have to be the one to say "Cut."

~

- Vivianna's P.O.V -

The Peacekeeper stood up, his white uniform now painted with my blood. He kicks my shoulder to check I'm alive as my eyes are closed and I groan out in pain and roll over. Satisfied, he walks away and locks the door again. I curse myself. If I'd have given Snow what he wanted, it would have saved me so much pain, so, so, so much. He even gave me a fair warning. But of course I had to ignore it. Because I couldn't give up my tokens. They were mine and they were from Finnick. I was surprised that they let me keep them, but glad, too. It kept me grounded and every night I would whisper to my wrist and feel comforted to know that Finnick was safe and well and could go on living, even if I was to die in this wretched cell.

So when I refused, they took them by force and promptly subjected me to torture, endless, agonizing torture. My hair, now longer, was matted with old blood mixed with fresh blood and I was sure it was in the worst condition it had ever been in. I didn't even want to look at my face, if I ever could. The only way I could vaguely see was by looking in the metal door of my cell, but it was always distorted, and the metal didn't reflect wonderfully. I was a mess. I had lost so much weight my bones were weak and prominent and I struggled to lift myself.

I didn't want to go on. And now they had taken away my anchor and I was left with nothing. Nothing to remind myself of Finnick. I moaned his name in anguish and began to sob heavily.

~

I was still sobbing hours later when I heard footsteps outside of my door. It was something new. I had grown to familiarize myself with the heavy booted march of the Peacekeepers and the determined step of Snow, so I knew this was someone else. A new torturer, perhaps.

The cell door is being unlocked, but not in the usual way. Slower and quieter as if someone is dragging out the build up to drive me insane. And it works for I stop my sobbing and back up into the corner in fresh fear. The door swings open and I see several figures, all in black and on their faces. A smoke like mist swirls around my feet and a memory pops into my head of the poisonous mist in the arena. The figure in front steps into my cell and I scream and cower further away and begin to shake fiercely. This was a new form of cruel.

"Anna, Anna - Anna!" someone hurries forward and crouched down to my level. They touch my arm but I scream louder and they remove it. "Hey, hey, it's Gale. It's me. You know me, Anna. It's Gale."

I stop screaming and breathe heavily. "Gale," I say very slowly. I couldn't see him behind the mask. It was a cruel trick it had to be. Lie to me that someone friendly had come to save me when they were to tell me it was someone I knew and have them torture. Who was next? Prim? Haymitch? Finnick?

"You're lying!" I shriek and begin to hit out at him, not doing any damage due to lack of strength and energy so he easily catches my hands.

"I'm not, Anna, it's me. Listen to my voice. I've come from District 13. We have Johanna and Peeta and we've come to get you. We've come to save you, Anna. Come to take you back to Finnick. He's waiting for you."

"Finnick," I whispered and closed my eyes to picture him. It was difficult now, but I could see his golden hair and beautiful bright eyes and that smile that always comforted me.

The masked man - Gale, as now I believed - turned to the others and nodded. "Can you stand?" he asks me softly and helps me up but I my legs collapse and I hit the floor again. "Okay, I'm going to have to carry you. Are you okay with that?"

I nod and let him pick me up, bridal style, and lead me out of the cell. I look back at it from over his shoulders as he carries me away. Bloodstained tiles. I began to cry as I left, knowing I'd be free soon. Knowing I'd soon be back to Finnick. Back home. I closed my eyes.