Chapter Text
“SNIPER! GET DOWN!” Johanna yelled.
Johanna grabbed Katniss by her belt; as Johanna and Cashmere hit the pavement, Katniss was yanked down too. Meanwhile, Hammerhead and Gloss shoved Peeta down and piled on top of him. Johanna and Cashmere, for whatever reason, did not pile on top of Katniss.
Bang came from somewhere ahead. Katniss heard a whizz sound above her.
“WHERE IS HE?” Hammerhead yelled.
“GAMES CENTER, PLUTARCH’S OFFICE!” Johanna yelled back.
Cashmere pushed herself up to kneel in front of Katniss, facing the Games Center building with her gun drawn.
“GET THEM IN THE LIMO!” Hammerhead yelled, as the right-rear door of the presidential limousine opened.
“Katniss?” said Prim. Fearfully.
Johanna and Cashmere stood up, and yanked Katniss to her feet. But Katniss did not look at the open limousine door, she looked at her sister.
All of the other District Twelve people were flat on the sidewalk now; Haymitch’s body covered Aloe Everdeen. But Prim stood grimacing with her hand over the left side of her face. Blood was running out between Prim’s fingers and was running down her left arm.
“Prim!” Katniss broke away from Johanna and Cashmere—
Bang! Whizz! Someone said in a Capitol accent, “That was close.”
—Katniss grabbed Prim by the waist, intending to haul her to the limousine, when Katniss was herself grabbed around the waist.
“Get in the fucking car!” Johanna yelled.
BANG! Hammerhead fired a pistol-shot toward the Games Center.
Johanna trying to drag both Katniss and Prim was slow going. “Let go of her!” Johanna yelled.
“Fuck you, Johanna!”
Then Gloss was there. Gloss picked up bleeding Prim; “Got her,” Gloss said to Katniss. “Get in the limo.”
Johanna and Cashmere shoved Katniss into the limousine right behind Gloss-carrying-Prim.
Once the doors were shut and Poole (acting as driver) hurried away, Peeta said, “Katniss, you have blood on you.”
Katniss said, “I wasn’t hit, but Prim is hurt!”
Hammerhead, meanwhile, had pulled out the limousine’s small first-aid kit and was using it on Prim.
Johanna said, “Motherfuck, Katniss, you are brainless! When bullets are flying and a bulletproof limousine is two steps away, you get in the fucking limousine! That’s what it’s there for.”
Cashmere said, “Jo, ease up. If Gloss got shot, I’d be just as stupid.”
Hammerhead said, “Primrose, it looks like all you have is a laceration where the bullet grazed you. I do not think the bullet penetrated you. But the injury is 4 centimeters long and 7 millimeters at the widest, which is why you’re bleeding so much.”
“Great,” Prim said. “Stitches.”
Katniss called forward to Poole, “Take us to the Training Center. They should still have the full first-aid station in the Gymnasium.”
As the limousine turned right, off of Avenue of the Tributes, Katniss saw through the window glass, Finnick standing on the corner. He was talking on his pocket-picturephone.
****
As soon as possible afterward
The Training Center had a keypad door on its north side, near the parking lot, which luckily still opened after Cashmere punched in a code. This way, six Victors and Prim were able to enter the Training Center without exposing themselves to sniper fire.
On the main floor, Katniss stabbed the Down button by the elevator. Just as the elevator doors opened, Katniss heard sirens from many directions, all getting louder.
Katniss told the others, “I think Finnick told the Peacekeepers about the sniper.”
Gloss said, “I bet the lowlife is a Gamemaker, or one of Plutarch’s rainbow friends.”
Seconds later, the seven people arrived at the Training Center Gymnasium. Without even trying to, Katniss noted that the bow and ten arrows were still at the same rack where they had been ten months ago.
“Hello, axes,” Johanna murmured.
Treating Prim at the First Aid station in the Gymnasium would not take long, it turned out, because Prim refused to let any of “you amateurs” stitch up her cheek. However, the healer-patient informed the Victors, the wound needed to be thoroughly cleaned first. Prim asked Katniss to be the person to pour rubbing alcohol onto her wound—
“But Little Duck, rubbing alcohol hurts! You’re asking me to hurt you!”
“No, big sister, I want you to heal me. Kill the nasty germs before they make trouble.”
A minute later, Hammerhead said to Katniss, “We’ve done all we can for your sister, for now.”
Katniss shook her head. “But I haven’t done all I can for Prim. That clown hurt my sister and he needs to pay for it.”
Katniss looked over at the racked bow.
Peeta said, “Katniss, don’t even think it. Peacekeepers are coming—let them handle the guy.”
****
Minutes earlier, after the limousine raced away
On the sidewalk by Avenue of the Tributes
Haymitch was lying on Aloe Everdeen; Aloe was lying on the sidewalk. Now Haymitch raised his head. “District Twelve people, everyone okay? Anyone hurt?”
When nobody groaned, or admitted to an injury, Haymitch stood up, and pulled Aloe up. “Change of plans, y’all: We walk from here to the Presidential Mansion—lucky for us, it’s right up the street—and once we get there, we’ll find out how Prim is.”
Haymitch murmured to Aloe, “I guarantee you, Prim is fine. Katniss will make sure of it.” Aloe nodded.
As the Twelves stood up, Haymitch noticed Capitol people on the sidewalk and at the edge of Dark Days Park, who were staring at the Twelves. A man asked the Twelves, “Why did you all drop down as soon as shooting started?”
Haymitch said patiently, “Don’t you ever watch holo-dramas? When a sniper starts shooting, you hit the ground.”
“But that’s in holo-dramas. How did you know to do it in real life?”
Haymitch looked at the Capitol man, considered several replies, then said, “You’ve never truly been in danger, have you?”
Minutes later, Haymitch had led the Twelves far enough westward on the Avenue of the Tributes sidewalk that they were crossing Games Street. There Haymitch saw Finnick standing on the opposite corner. Finnick had his pocket-picturephone to his mouth and was facing the Games Center on the other side of City Circle. Haymitch heard Finnick say, “Yes, he’s still in Heavensbee’s office, but he’s not shooting.”
Once all the Twelves had crossed the street, Finnick gestured for Haymitch to come over. “Hey, will you take this inside?” Finnick gestured toward the shrimp ring at his feet. “I think I’m going to be standing here a while.”
By then, Haymitch was hearing approaching sirens. “Yeah, the Peacekeepers need a spotter.”
****
Minutes later
Haymitch was talking to the Peacekeepers at the Presidential Mansion’s east-side Peacekeeper station, and Haymitch was frustrated.
The problem was not whether the District Twelve group would be allowed back into the Mansion to rejoin the birthday party. This had been easily achieved, once the Twelves all had showed picture IDs.
The problem was that the presidential limousine, which logically should have raced back to the Presidential Mansion, had done no such thing. Aloe Everdeen was anxious to know about her injured daughter, and the Peacekeepers outside the Mansion could not answer her questions.
Meanwhile, Haymitch saw that Peacekeeper vehicles were surrounding the Games Center next to the Presidential Mansion, and many Peacekeepers with serious firearms were entering the Games Center.
Also next to the Presidential Mansion was the Training Center. Suddenly gunshots sounded from the Training Center. Glass shattered in the south-facing window on the seventh floor of the twelve-story building; at the same time, glass shattered in the north-facing window of Plutarch’s office in the Games Center.
“What’s happening?” Madge Undersee asked, as several more gunshots sounded from the District Seven floor of the Training Center.
“Johanna is being Johanna,” Haymitch replied, in the sudden quiet.
The Twelves gasped as the sniper’s rifle barrel suddenly appeared, outside where the Head Gamemaker’s north-side window had been.
But at the same moment, an arrow flew out of the Training Center’s District Seven apartment, over City Circle, and toward the sniper and his rifle.
Haymitch got angry. Sweetheart is facing off against a sniper? If she lives through this, I’ll kill her myself.
****
Meanwhile, in Plutarch Heavensbee’s office
Soldier Mitchell was dying, he knew it. But he had not yet failed in his mission.
The Victor-bodyguards, who had shot him from forty meters away, had put bullets in him; he respected them because they had not flustered in battle. But Mitchell was not yet dead, so he still could kill Katniss Mellark to complete his mission.
As for the quote-unquote Peacekeepers, the lapdog quote-unquote “soldiers” of the Capitol, Mitchell could hear them below in the Games Center, stomping like elephants. If Mitchell lived long enough, they would find him. Mitchell doubted that the Peacekeepers intended to handcuff him and to put him on trial.
But whatever the Peacekeepers’ plans for Mitchell, he would not be alive for them to carry out those plans. Mitchell decided that while he was sure to die today, he refused to be killed by men who deserved less respect as soldiers than even District Thirteen fourteen-year-olds.
After the Victor-bodyguards had shot at Mitchell and had wounded him, now a strange thing happened: they stopped shooting and they lowered their guns a little. Then, while Mitchell was trying to guess why the Victor-bodyguards had ceased fire, Katniss Mellark herself stepped forward, near the ruined window. She was pointing an arrow at Mitchell; but for some reason, she did not fire the arrow.
Mitchell moving his body hurt now, but he made himself raise his sniper rifle and aim it at Katniss Mellark. This was when she fired her arrow. It took the arrow only a second to fly forty meters and reach him.
Oddly, the arrow-shot did not kill Mitchell. Indeed, it did not even injure him. But instead, his sniper-rifle slammed into his shoulder, hard enough to knock Mitchell off his feet and back away from the window.
Slowly, painfully, bullet-bleeding Mitchell stood up and again took aim at Katniss Mellark. The Victor-bodyguards now were bringing their pistols up to shoot him; but Katniss herself was holding her bow down by her right side, with no arrow nocked and no arrow in her left hand. Mitchell could not guess why she was presenting herself as such an easy target, but he would take advantage of her defenselessness in his last second of life.
Mitchell covered Katniss Mellark’s forehead with his crosshairs, as her magnified face stared back at him. Mitchell pulled the trigger.
It was the last thing he ever did; an instant later, his rifle exploded.
A half-second later, when four more pistol-bullets slammed into Mitchell’s falling body, he was already dead.
****
On the other side of City Circle, in the Training Center’s District Seven Apartment
Johanna grinned at Katniss. “The shithead didn’t realize that you plugged the end of his rifle barrel with your arrow.”
Katniss chin-pointed to the other side of City Circle. “He hurt Prim. He might have killed Prim. He deserved everything he got.”
Hammerhead said calmly, “Let’s head back to the Mansion. I hope everyone realizes that all of us except Prim will get our asses royally chewed out by President Snow.”
****
Minutes later
Party Room No. 2, the Presidential Mansion
President Snow was not the first unhappy man whom Katniss had to deal with. Katniss, Peeta, blood-covered Prim, and the Victor-bodyguards re-entered the party room to discover dead silence, except for a news-reporter’s voice that came from a holo-projector on wheels that had not been in the room an hour ago. When Haymitch turned away from the news report to see Katniss and the others walk in, he ran over to her.
Haymitch was still a strong man and Katniss was a small girl, so Haymitch could pick her up if he wanted to. Now he wanted to.
Katniss’s feet came off the ground as she traveled backward and was slammed against the wall. “What kind of thoughtless shit were you trying to pull, sweetheart?” Haymitch yelled. He looked murderous.
“He hurt Prim. I killed him,” Katniss said, trying not to sound like a frightened child.
“No, sweetheart, you pulled some holo-drama stunt that left yourself wide open for him to kill you, but you got lucky. You.”—he shook her—“Got.”—Haymitch shook Katniss again—“Lucky. L-U-C-K-Y.”
Now Cinna was standing next to the two of them. Calmly he said, “Haymitch, please.” Haymitch let Katniss drop to the floor; Katniss shot Haymitch a glare.
But then Cinna looked at Katniss with sad eyes. “What you did was reckless, Katniss.”
Katniss suddenly felt awful. The only way she could have felt any worse is if Cinna had said I am disappointed in you, Girl on Fire.
“I am disappointed in you, Katniss,” Coriolanus said. He had entered the room without Katniss noticing. “But first, let me take care of your sister.”
Coriolanus called back over his shoulder, “Hefaestus, take Miss Everdeen to Victor Health Hospital on my authority. Tell them they are to make Miss Everdeen’s cheek healthy, and they are to make it pretty. Then Hefaestus, buy Miss Everdeen whatever replacement clothing she needs, on my account.”
“I get to go inside Victor Health Hospital?” asked Katniss’s sister the healer. “Thank you, President Snow!”
After Hefaestus and smiling Prim left the room, Coriolanus looked at Katniss and repeated, “I am disappointed in you.” Coriolanus continued, “Sometimes you shine with glorious potential, but today you acted less mature than Minerva.”
“But Prim—”
“You endangered all four Victor-bodyguards, and you endangered yourself, because of someone who had taken only minor injuries. You also revealed a critical weakness in yourself to your enemies—and believe me, you have enemies now, note the plural, who number more than one dead man with a rifle. Perhaps you still think of yourself as one dead miner’s older daughter, but you are much more than this now. Tell her, Haymitch—tell her what she means to the districts.”
Haymitch blinked in surprise at the president’s words, then Haymitch said to Katniss, “Your soulmate’s gonna die soon, yeah? What happens afterward if you’re already dead because of some fool stunt? Then some rainbow fuckhead becomes the next president, and the districts keep on getting screwed over. That is, unless the districts rebel. But since you’re dead, this cuts down the chances of the districts winning the Second Rebellion. Imagine life in the districts if we fight two rebellions and lose both of them. But win or lose, if the districts rebel, district people will die. On the other hand, if you’re alive and healthy when Snow dies, then you become president and the districts stop getting screwed over, without needing a Rebellion. Nobody dies in any of the districts.”
Coriolanus said, “Nobody would die in the Capitol either, if another rebellion were averted.”
Katniss said quietly, “I don’t want any Capitol people in this room to die. Not even Minerva’s friends whose names I don’t remember.” Then Katniss frowned. “Except maybe Plutarch. How the hell did the sniper get into Plutarch’s office?”
Coriolanus said, “I am curious about this myself.”
Plutarch, Katniss noticed, was in the far corner of the room, talking quietly with Hammerhead.
Looking around the room, Katniss noticed that Peeta and Minerva were standing silently nearby and were listening. Peeta—whom Katniss loved; and Minerva—whom Coriolanus loved.
With a mixture of anger and confusion, Katniss said to Coriolanus, “You talk about me trying to save Prim as if it’s a bad thing. Why is it bad?”
It was Finnick, who had walked into the party room without Katniss noticing, who answered: “When there is someone whom you will do anything to protect, an enemy can push you around. This is bad enough when you’re a Victor. If you become president, I suppose it would be a disaster.”
“It would be,” Coriolanus agreed, “unless you decide that nothing is more important than your duty as president. Nothing, Katniss.”
Then Coriolanus told a story—
****
“Katniss, you know I have a son and a granddaughter, but do you know why I no longer have a wife? A long time ago, the Minister of Peace, Andronicus Williams, kidnapped Malvinia and threatened to kill her if I did not go to a certain place at a certain time. Obviously it was a trap; what is not obvious is that I did not go to the meeting place. Angry Andronicus killed Malvinia on holo-camera.”
“Poor Grandma,” Minerva said. “Poor Grandpa.” She stepped forward and rubbed Coriolanus’s back.
Coriolanus said, “Later, Andronicus was captured. I ordered him dismembered, I watched his death in person, then I returned here to the Mansion. In the privacy of my room, I vomited because of the gruesomeness I had just seen, then I wept for Malvinia. But Katniss, my point is that in those minutes, I was alive to weep for Malvinia and I was president, but Andronicus was neither.”
Minerva asked, “Grandpa, if a bad man kidnapped me, would the same thing happen?”
Coriolanus sadly nodded his head.
Minerva stood straight and raised her chin. “If that day ever comes, Grandpa, I will be brave.”
****
Katniss looked at Peeta, Cinna, Haymitch, and Coriolanus. “I hear what y’all are saying. I endangered my bodyguards because I was selfish; and in a minute, I will tell all of them I’m sorry. But hear me now: Whether as tribute or as president, I will not be a piece in anyone’s game; expect the unexpected from me from now on.”
Coriolanus gave Katniss a piercing look, then he said, “At least now you understand what is at stake.” Then Coriolanus’s voice turned to steel. “Now, Katniss, let’s you and I have a chat with Mr. Heavensbee.”
****
One second later
Hammerhead walked up to Katniss and Coriolanus, with a sweaty Plutarch Heavensbee following behind Hammerhead.
Hammerhead said, “Katniss, apology accepted. Mr. President, Plutarch here has something he wants to tell you.”
Coriolanus turned to look at the pudgy former Head Gamemaker. Katniss stared at Plutarch Heavensbee as fiercely as a snake would, and her look was just as unfriendly.
Hammerhead said, “Plutarch, your best hope is to come clean.”
Plutarch did indeed come clean. Less than fifteen seconds into Plutarch’s talk, Yeast Mellark blurted, “District Thirteen is alive?”
Gale blurted, “C’mon, ‘President’ Coin?”
Suddenly the entire room—Capitols and Twelves, young people and mature—all were listening to Plutarch’s tale. Even the Avoxes were listening.
Katniss could not get a read on her soulmate; she could not tell whether Coriolanus was as stunned by what he was hearing as Katniss was, or if all of this was old news to him.
“What do you think, Katniss?” Coriolanus asked, and she still could not read him. Plutarch could not either; he was clearly panicked.
Katniss glared at Plutarch. “Why should we believe what you say?”
Heavensbee said, “I can’t prove I’m telling the truth, but I am. I thought I was working to make a successful Rebellion, which would make a better Panem for everyone. But Katniss, when you made me no longer useful to President Coin, she tried to kill you and she set me up to take the fall. Call me a traitor, fine; call me a spy, it’s what I am—but I am no murderer, and I don’t like President Coin using me as thoughtlessly as a roll of toilet paper.”
Katniss said to Coriolanus, “Let’s talk in the hallway.”
Coriolanus led Katniss out of the party room, down the hallway, and into an empty room. Katniss asked him, “How many spies do you have in District Thirteen?”
Coriolanus said, “None. I have not had a spy in District Thirteen in twenty-three years.”
Katniss said, “You keep telling me to be practical. The practical thing is to reverse his polarity as a spy.”
Coriolanus blinked. “ ‘Reverse his polarity’? This is a District Three term.”
Katniss grinned. “Uh-huh. Gamma and me have been working our way through those other-district books you sent.”
Coriolanus grinned. “Has your reading included ‘Peacekeeper Detective Lewis’ novels?”
“No, why?”
“Let me explain to you something known as ‘Nice Peacekeeper, mean Peacekeeper.’ ”
One minute later, Katniss and Coriolanus walked back into the party room, fetched Plutarch, and walked him into the empty room that they had just left. Coriolanus looked furious, and Plutarch looked frightened for his life.
Katniss said to Plutarch in the empty room, as silent Coriolanus glared at him, “Here’s how things are. President Snow wants to hold a show trial, then execute you in a nasty way.”
“A very nasty way,” Coriolanus said. “You are a traitor.”
Plutarch turned white.
Coriolanus added, “At the least, Mr. Heavensbee, you should be taken to the basement and shot before Katniss’s birthday party ends this afternoon.”
Plutarch stared in horror.
Katniss said to Plutarch, “Meanwhile here’s me, Panem’s next president—no thanks to you. I gotta be honest, I don’t like you. Really, I don’t like any Gamemaker, but as for you, I’m still pissed that you thought you deserved to attend my wedding last September.”
Plutarch started to say something, but stopped.
Katniss said, “But, Mr. Head Gamemaker, you were working for the Second Rebellion, which to me”—Katniss shot Coriolanus a sideways look—“makes you a little bit of a hero. I think someone who’s a little bit of a hero should be treated a little bit nice. Besides, I believe your story, including the part that you didn’t want to kill me or kill Prim.”
Now Plutarch looked hopeful.
Katniss continued, “So instead of you being tied to a post in City Circle and our president watches me shoot an arrow through your heart, I suggest you spy on District Thirteen for us. But you have to tell us everything. If ‘President’ Coin tells you her dog had puppies, you report how many puppies.”
As soon as Katniss said this, relieved-looking Plutarch began divulging. Among the more useless bits of information he shared: Plutarch was letting District Thirteen pirate off his Panem News Network subscription.
****
Meanwhile, elsewhere in the Capitol
While Katniss was learning about President Coin, President Coin was learning about Katniss. On encrypted radio, Col. Boggs told his leader how Soldier Mitchell had died.
Then Col. Boggs said, “Ma’am, I was sitting in the grandstands south of Avenue of the Tributes, so I saw the entire thing play out. I saw Soldier Mitchell’s first shot at Mrs. Mellark—which somehow she knew to duck—on through her freakishly accurate arrow-shot that made his rifle blow up. What I did not see, even slightly, was the brilliant tactician who bested three Career tributes in her Hunger Games. Today Katniss Mellark’s sister Primrose was not even seriously injured, only slightly injured, but from the moment the girl was hurt, Katniss Mellark acted foolishly.”