The Hunger Games: Uprising!

Chapter 9

I wake early and slide out from under the covers trying not to wake Peeta.

I walk over to our bags to see what he's packed for us. Among other things I find trousers underwear, my hunting jacket and two bath robes. I pull mine out and slip it on.

"I preferred you without the robe" he says sleepily.

"I thought you were still sleeping"

"No, just dozing"

I look through the case and find the small parachute from the quarter quell games.

"Why did you pack this?"

"I was in a rush and thought I'd throw it in"

"Thanks" I unwrap it and find the pearl, together with the spile. I show him the pearl, "remember this?"

"Yeah" he smiles at me.

Suddenly all the memories flood back from the beach in the arena. Peeta and I kissing, the first time I think I really knew how I felt about him. I put the pearl back in the parachute and wrap it back up safely.

We both shower, get dressed and eat a light breakfast. I feed buttercup and we wait to be called for the meeting.

"Peeta, how come Megan and Joel were at the meeting last night. I mean it's not like they were involved in the rebellion or are soldiers or anything"

"They were though, don't forget they both came from here. Megan was a soldier like us and Joel was a Sergeant"

"Oh, I didn't know that"

I start to wonder what they saw during the war, where their parents died and how they must be feeling right now. I find it strange that they've never spoken about it. All of a sudden there's a knock at the door. Peeta opens it and the soldier from last night is standing in the corridor with Haymitch.

We walk out and shut the door.

"Where's the others" Peeta asks.

"It's just you three for this meeting, if you'll follow me"

We ride back in the elevator and we're escorted back to the command room.

Only Plutarch is sat at the table waiting for us.

"Good Morning, I trust you were comfortable with your quarters".

"Yes, thank you Plutarch they're very nice compared to what was here before" says Peeta.

"Take a seat and I'll try to explain, we've a lot to talk about, and I'm sure you have a lot of questions"

We seat ourselves across the table from Plutarch with Haymitch and Peeta sat either side of me. I normally hate these sort of briefings but the fact that it's just us three, and that we need to find out what's going on gets me focused.

"There's been more developments overnight and we now know how they've taken control of the Capitol. As things stand they don't have much of an army, well they do have an army of sorts but they're not using soldiers, they're using mutts"

We all look at each other in shock.

Plutarch taps on a keyboard in front of him and the screen illuminates on the wall at the end of the table. Suddenly video footage starts to play on the screen, it's very poor quality with a lot of camera movement. You can see small fires dotted around but it's the mutts that grab your attention. There the same as the mutt we fought at the lake, only there's dozens of them, picking up soldiers and throwing them against buildings, ripping them limb from limb. It's appalling to see. Plutarch pauses the image with a mutt walking toward the camera.