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Out in the hall, I find Paylor standing in exactly the sa for?" she asks
I hold up the white bud in answer and then stumble past her II know, I&039;lass ater fro the rose in it I sink to my knees on the cold tile and squint at the flower, as the whiteness seeer catches the inside ofon to reality the way it did for Peeta Ion I must know the truth about what has happened
There are two possibilities, although the details associated with them may vary First, as I&039;ve believed, that the Capitol sent in that hovercraft, dropped the parachutes, and sacrificed its children&039;s lives, knowing the recently arrived rebels would go to their aid There&039;s evidence to support this The Capitol&039;s seal on the hovercraft, the lack of any atte history of using children as pawns in their battle against the districts Then there&039;s Snow&039;s account That a Capitol hovercrafta speedy end to the war But if this was the case, why didn&039;t the Capitol fire on the enemy? Did the element of surprise throw them? Had they no defenses left? Children are precious to 13, or so it has always seemed Well, not me, maybe Once I had outlived h I think it&039;s been a long time since I&039;ve been considered a child in this war And ould they do it knowing their own medics would likely respond and be taken out by the second blast? They wouldn&039;t They couldn&039;t Snow&039;s lying Manipulating ainst the rebels and possibly destroy the atbombs, for one It&039;s not that the Capitol couldn&039;t have the same weapon, it&039;s just that I&039;m sure the rebels did Gale and Beetee&039;s brainchild Then there&039;s the fact that Snow made no escape attempt, when I know him to be the consummate survivor It seems hard to believe he didn&039;t have a retreat somewhere, some bunker stocked with provisions where he could live out the rest of his snaky little life And finally, there&039;s his assessment of Coin What&039;s irrefutable is that she&039;s done exactly what he said Let the Capitol and the districts run one another into the ground and then sauntered in to take power Even if that was her plan, it doesn&039;t mean she dropped those parachutes Victory was already in her grasp Everything was in her grasp
Except s&039;s response when I adht into Snow&039;s successor "If your immediate answer isn&039;t Coin, then you&039;re a threat You&039;re the face of the rebellion You le person Outwardly, the most you&039;ve ever done is tolerated her"
Suddenly, I&039; of Priranted the title of soldier, but so happen? That my sister would have wanted to be there, I have no doubt That she would be iven But for all that, so a thirteen-year-old in co Prie? Or, at least, firmly on her side? I wouldn&039;t even have had to witness it in person Nu thecrazy, slipping into some state of paranoia Too et out Or would it? Who would have to know besides Coin, Plutarch, and a small, loyal or easily disposable crew?
I badly need help working this out, only everyone I trust is dead Cinna Boggs Finnick Prim There&039;s Peeta, but he couldn&039;t do any more than speculate, and who knohat state his mind&039;s in, anyway And that leaves only Gale He&039;s far away, but even if he were beside me, could I confide in hi that it was his bomb that killed Prim? The impossibility of that idea,
Ultiht knohat happened and ht still be on my side To broach the subject at all will be a risk But while I think Hayamble with my life in the arena, I don&039;t think he&039;d rat me out to Coin Whatever proble our differences one-on-one
I scramble off the tiles, out the door, and across the hall to his room When there&039;s no response tohow quickly he can defile a space Half-eaten plates of food, shattered liquor bottles, and pieces of broken furniture froe scatter his quarters He lies, unkele of sheets on the bed, passed out
"Hay Of course, that&039;s insufficient But I give it a few more tries before I duasp, slashing blindly with his knife Apparently, the end of Snow&039;s reign didn&039;t equal the end of his terror
"Oh You," he says I can tell by his voice that he&039;s still loaded
"Hayjay found her voice" He laughs "Well, Plutarch&039;s going to be happy" He takes a swig fro wet?" I lamely drop the pitcher behind me into a pile of dirty clothes
"I need your help," I say
Hay the air hite liquor fumes "What is it, sweetheart? More boy trouble?" I don&039;t knohy, but this hurts me in a way Haymitch rarely can It must show on my face, because even in his drunken state, he tries to take it back "Okay, not funny" I&039;m already at the door "Not funny! Co the floor, I assume he tried to follow h the s I yank theers until I have a pile and then burrow into it In the lining oftablet and s it dry, heading off s, though I hear Hay me in the distance, but he won&039;t find me in his condition Especially not in this new spot Swathed in silk, I feel like a caterpillar in a cocoon awaiting metamorphosis I always supposed that to be a peaceful condition At first it is But as I journey into night, I feel s, unable to e of beauty I squirrowing flawless wings Despite enormous effort, I remain a hideous creature, fired into my current form by the blast from the bombs
The encounter with Snow opens the door toby tracker jackers again A wave of horrifying i - only to find another wave knockingon the floor of the wardrobe, tangled in silk, screaht the to help, peel away the choking garments, and escort ray, snon spreading across the Capitol
A very hungover Haymitch waits with a handful of pills and a tray of food that neither of us has the stoain but, seeing it&039;s pointless, sends me to a bath someone has drawn The tub&039;s deep, with three steps to the bottom I ease down into the ater and sit, up tothe medicines kick in soon My eyes focus on the rose that has spread its petals overnight, filling the stea perfume I rise and reach for a towel to smother it, when there&039;s a tentative knock and the bathroo three familiar faces They try to smile at ed mutt body "Surprise!" Octavia squeaks, and then bursts into tears I&039; over their reappearance when I realize that this must be it, the day of the execution They&039;ve come to prep me for the cameras Re It&039;s an impossible task
They can barely touchme, so I rinse and dry off myself I tell them I hardly notice the pain anymore, but Flavius still winces as he drapes a robe around ht in a chair Polished froripping a clipboard Reed except for the vacant look in her eyes
"Effie," I say
"Hello, Katniss" She stands and kisseshas occurred since our last ht before the Quarter Quell "Well, it looks like we&039;ve got another big, big, big day ahead of us So why don&039;t you start your prep and I&039;ll just pop over and check on the arrangements"
"Okay," I say to her back
"They say Plutarch and Hay her alive," comments Venia under her breath
"She was imprisoned after your escape, so that helps"
It&039;s quite a stretch Effie Trinket, rebel But I don&039;t want Coin killing her, so I uess it&039;s good Plutarch kidnapped you three after all"
"We&039;re the only prep team still alive And all the stylists from the Quarter Quell are dead," says Venia She doesn&039;t say who specifically killed theerly takes one of my scarred hands and holds it out for inspection "Nohat do you think for the nails? Red or maybe a jet black?"
Flavius perfor to even out the front while getting soer locks to hide the bald spots in the back My face, since it was spared froes Once I&039;jay suit, the only scars visible are on jay pin over my heart and we step back to look in the mirror I can&039;t believe how normal they&039;ve made me look on the outside when inwardly I&039;m such a wasteland
There&039;s a tap at the door and Gale steps in "Can I have a minute?" he asks In the o, they bump into one another a few times and then closet themselves in the bathroom Gale comes up behind me and we exa for soirl and boy who o and beca ould have happened to theirl If she would have fallen in love with the boy, married him even And sometime in the future, when the brothers and sisters had been raised up, escaped with him into the woods and left 12 behind forever Would they have been happy, out in the wild, or would the dark, twisted sadness between therown up even without the Capitol&039;s help?
"I brought you this" Gale holds up a sheath When I take it, I notice it holds a single, ordinary arrow "It&039;s supposed to be sy the last shot of the war"
"What if Iit back to h the head herself?"
"You won&039;t miss" Gale adjusts the sheath on my shoulder
We stand there, face-to-face, noteach other&039;s eyes "You didn&039;t come see me in the hospital" He doesn&039;t answer, so finally I just say it "Was it your bomb?"
"I don&039;t know Neither does Beetee," he says "Does itabout it"
He waits for me to deny it; I want to deny it, but it&039;s true Even now I can see the flash that ignites her, feel the heat of the flames And I will never be able to separate that moment from Gale My silence isfor ht, okay?" He touches my cheek and leaves I want to call hiure out a way to make peace with this To remember the circumstances under which he created the bo up the truth about who dropped the parachutes Prove it wasn&039;t the rebels Forgive him But since I can&039;t, I&039;ll just have to deal with the pain
Effie co I collectin its glass of water When I open the door to the bathrooe of the tub, hunched and defeated I remember I&039;m not the only one whose world has been stripped away "Co"
I&039; in which Plutarch instructsSnow Instead, I find myself sent into a room where six people sit around a table Peeta, Johanna, Beetee, Hayray rebel uniforms from 13 No one looks particularly well "What&039;s this?" I say
"We&039;re not sure," Hay victors"