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The 75th Hunger Games start terribly, is what Enobaria thinks. Plutarch Heavensbee being in charge could not have been a coincidence, as the rebels seem to have found just the weapons they need. Immediately, Katniss Everdeen picks up a bow and arrow, and Finnick grabs a trident. She can't see what 7 is doing, because Katniss is already firing on her, perhaps her anger at the District 2 tributes from last year reflected on her, or perhaps Haymitch or Finnick told her to do this.
Enobaria doesn't want to kill Katniss, exactly, but when Katniss also fires arrows at Gloss and Brutus, she begins to change her mind. She is only targeting Districts 1 and 2. Interesting. Eventually, Katniss and Peeta disappear with Mags and Finnick, and the District 3 pair leave with 7, and she and Brutus and Cash and Gloss have their pick of what's remaining in the Cornucopia. There's a few others left alive, at least she thinks Elin and Chaff made it, but that might be it. She sees Seeder's body near the Cornucopia and touches her own braids: Seeder had done a fantastic job just before she entered the arena, kissing the top of her head, even, despite Enobaria's suspicions that she was helping the alliance.
She also sees Cecilia's body, half underwater, and hopes it will be retrieved soon. She thinks of her three children and turns away, trying to stay focused. She finds two daggers, which she slips into her belt, and a sword, which she carries in hand. She was famous for the kill with her teeth, but she preferred a blade, if possible.
Cashmere and Gloss are picking through the backpacks, looking with no luck for food or water. Brutus is climbing the Cornucopia, trying to get a better view of the arena. He sits up there for a while, and Enobaria doesn't mind the break from him: his presence is intense.
"Feeling alright?" Cashmere asks, sneaking up behind Enobaria and bumping her lightly with her hip. It's a bad joke. They're in the Hunger Games, for the second time, after all.
"Is Gloss ok?" she asks, instead of answering. Katniss had fired several arrows, but the only one that struck true had hit Gloss in the lower leg.
"He'll be able to walk on it. Chrome's a good Mentor. He'll be able to send medication if it seems like it's getting infected."
Enobaria nods, accepting this. Cashmere reaches out to put a hand on her neck, a gesture Enobaria finds far too affectionate for the cameras. She steps back, thinking of her mother watching, of Lyme, of her siblings, her nieces. It was one thing to love Cashmere in the privacy of their rooms, another to love her where all of Panem could watch and comment on it, where Snow could use this against her.
Cashmere looks hurt, but doesn't push the gesture further. A moment later, Brutus shouts down to them. "It's in segments!"
"What?" Cashmere calls up.
"There's segments… 8 or 10… maybe 12? Oh! 12 would make sense if it's on the hour."
"I don't understand."
Brutus leans over the edge of the Cornucopia. "Think of the arena in wedges. I think… every hour, something bad happens in one of them, and ends at the end of the hour, then the next wedge starts acting up."
"So we go to the one that just stopped, and we'll be fine for 12 hours." Gloss surmises.
"Unless it's not 12," Enobaria says. "Or they repeat. We haven't been through a full cycle."
"We should keep someone here, to mark down the cycle, but the rest of us should take cover."
In the end, they come up with a rotation, with one pair at the Cornucopia, and the other pair resting under the tree cover. Enobaria sits watch first with Brutus, though she's on guard, while he tries to map the arena.
She wonders what the point of the rebel alliance is. What the point of Heavensbee as Head Gamemaker is. It has to be some spectacle, some symbol to the Capitol of the rebel plan coming to fruition - this is on Plutarch's 5-year timeline, and all, but she just cannot fathom what it can possibly be. Right now, this feels like a Hunger Games like any other, except worse, since they've trapped a bunch of Victors inside. Is that it? To get rid of the Hunger Games by getting rid of all the evidence they've ever existed? It doesn't feel like a cause Finnick or Johanna would die for.
She wishes Finnick came to her, rather than to Brutus and Gloss, but something must have stopped him. Johanna?
She doesn't know if she would have helped, exactly, but right now she feels like she's groping around in the dark. When it's her turn to sleep, she does so fitfully, like everyone probably does in the arena, fearful that true, deep sleep would be welcoming death.
It is odd, to be in the Hunger Games solely with people she knows. She doesn't really know Katniss and Peeta, she supposes, but excepting them, everyone else she's known for years. So the next day, when Gloss signals that there are others making their way back towards the Cornucopia, she braces herself for confrontation with people she's sat next to as a Mentor for years, for the possibility of killing someone she might have otherwise shared a drink with. She and Brutus cross the water to the Cornucopia on the opposite side as the rebel alliance, sneaking around the back. They meet up with Gloss and Cashmere, hiding on the far side, waiting and watching for now.
When they can finally see who is emerging from the tree cover, they get ready. It's Peeta, Katniss, Johanna, Finnick, and strangely enough, Wiress and Beetee. "Let's stay here for now," Cashmere suggests. "We can get a sneak attack in."
She looks weaker, today. Enobaria wonders if she is hiding an injury. Once the others get to the Cornucopia, they don't look for anyone else, they don't even have anyone keeping watch.
With a hand gesture, Gloss points to himself, then to Wiress, who is away from the rest of the group, unarmed. She's injured, it's obvious, easy to kill off. Enobaria thinks he should wait, she would be easy enough to kill later. They should use the element of surprise on Finnick, or Katniss herself. But Brutus is nodding him on, and so he goes to the water's edge.
Soon enough, the woman is dead, a simple kill that hopefully granted her a swift death. But their surprise is gone, as Katniss notices Gloss with a shout, her first arrow true, and Enobaria wonders if her training score was not overstated as he falls, her arrow embedded in his temple.
"No!" Enobaria can hear Cashmere's rage and grief as she runs forward, charging at Katniss. Enobaria reaches for her shirt, for her arm, for any part of Cashmere, to keep her from running stupidly into danger, but she's too slow, or Cashmere is too fast, not allowing anything to keep her from avenging Gloss.
And Katniss is not expecting the attack, she's facing the wrong direction, so Enobaria thinks Cashmere might make it - she might actually get her dagger under Katniss's ribs or in her throat or wherever she wanted to put it, until out of nowhere, Johanna intercepts her and slams her axe into Cashmere's chest mid-stride. The force is brutal, sending both of them onto the sand, and Cashmere makes one awful clawing sort of motion before falling still.
And Enobaria still hasn't moved from her spot in the shadows, allowing the rebel alliance to think this was just a District 1 attack. But how can she move? Gloss and Cashmere were just killed. Gloss and Cashmere were both dead. Soon their bodies would be retrieved and she would never see them again. She's torn from her thoughts as Finnick rounds the corner, making eye contact with her and Brutus. Brutus charges out towards him, and she goes in the direction of Katniss, knowing that the entire Games might be decided here and now.
It's only the spinning of the arena that saves them, tossing them all - living and dead - back into the water. Brutus finds her and they swim off in a different direction to where it looks like the others are going, relatively unhurt but decidedly outnumbered.
It isn't until she's laying down on the opposite shore that it really kicks in. Cashmere is dead. Cashmere is dead with an axe wound to the chest, because Johanna killed her. Gloss is dead with Katniss Everdeen's arrow to his head.
Brutus is restless, pacing and practicing with his knife. "What was that?" he asks her after a while.
She doesn't have an answer. If it was any other Games, she could say something like "Gloss killed their ally, he provoked them," but it isn't any other Games.
They spend a little time spying, before they go in for their attack. They're greatly outnumbered, so they need to strategize. It seems the rebels are splitting up, though, and Katniss and Johanna are leaving the others.
They decide to take them down first, and as much as it will be frustrating to kill Finnick after, the women have proven the greater threat.
At first, Enobaria was admittedly hesitant to kill Johanna. She had a soft spot for the other woman that she couldn't really explain, it just happened naturally when she watched her Games, and never faded. But now, after watching her drive her axe into Cashmere's chest without a second thought, she thinks she has what it takes to finish her off. This is the Hunger Games, after all. There can only be one winner, at the end.
When Johanna and Katniss separate from the rest of the group on the third day, Brutus and Enobaria first raid their camp for water. They've been so thirsty over the past days that even the last inches of water in the buckets in the rebel camp taste delicious. They also find remnants of food, which they eat greedily. It is clear that there are no plans on returning to this camp.
Then, they follow Johanna and Katniss. It's easy, with a long spool of wire leading down to the beach. They stay in the shadows, watching as the two of them walk side by side, until Johanna's slightly shorter figure turns and bashes Katniss on the head with something. Enobaria feels Brutus's arm against her, holding her back, to watch this play out. They watch Johanna lean over Katniss with a dagger, stab a few times, then stand and give her a kick for good measure. Enobaria can't understand what she's seeing. Is Johanna Mason betraying the rebels? Is she trying to win the Hunger Games by betraying Haymitch?
"I know you're there," she says, looking a little to the left of where Enobaria and Brutus are standing. "Let's get this over with."
Brutus steps out of the tree cover, and Enobaria follows. Johanna doesn't have any ranged weapons, it's clear. They both take a minute to inspect Katniss's limp and bloody form. They don't bother asking why she betrayed Katniss, there's no way they're getting an answer now.
"Gonna stand and fight?" Enobaria asks.
Johanna quirks her lips. "Only if you can catch me," she says.
Enobaria, of course, can catch her, but Brutus is slower, less nimble in the jungle terrain, but he catches sight of someone else - Finnick? Peeta? and takes off in that direction instead.
Enobaria throws one of her knives, and it's this, clipping Johanna in the left shoulder, that finally stops her, and she trips, turning onto her back immediately to face up to Enobaria, axe held tightly.
She would be so easy to kill, so easy, and yet Enobaria can't do it. Johanna doesn't even look afraid - like she would ever beg for her life, Enobaria thinks - but rather defiant. "What's your plan?" Enobaria asks. "You and Katniss die so Finnick can win? How noble."
Now Johanna does smile, just a little, but her knuckles are still white around the handle of the axe. "Yeah, it's all for him," she offers, "But I'm not going to just roll over and die!"
But just as she jumps up to swing at Enobaria, the entire arena seems to be struck by lightning. They do clash, and Enobaria feels the axe hit her clumsily against her hip. She tackles Johanna so that she's once again laying on her back, kneeling on her arms, her dagger against Johanna's throat.
The lightning or whatever it was seems to have taken down some trees, and Enobaria can see others up the ridge a just a bit. A larger man… Brutus? And another - though in the dark, and from such a distance, she can't tell who. And a woman, even closer to them. Katniss? Had she still been alive?
This had to have been the rebel plot. She realizes this is why they unspooled the wire - this is why they allied with 3 - they needed their know-how, and just like the year with the bombs, or the last Quarter Quell, they planned to intentionally destroy the arena. Like in Haymitch's year. Enobaria leans over Johanna so that microphones, if there still are any, can't pick them up. "What just happened?" she asks, pressing the edge of the dagger into Johanna's neck to show her urgency.
"They're coming," Johanna says. "The forcefield is gone now."
"Who? Who is coming?"
Johanna shrugs. "Gotta hope it's the right ones."
Still, Enobaria doesn't release Johanna, nor does Johanna struggle away from her. They wait like this for a few seconds more until a hovercraft does descend, but it isn't the hovercraft that takes the bodies, but one with a hatch open, with people peering out from it. It's dark, and Enobaria can't make out any faces.
"Get the Mockingjay!" one is shouting, but they're too high up the ridge.
"Grab those two, then hurry. The others are dead." another voice. Haymitch, possibly.
Two survivors on the ridge? Was Brutus alive?
"She's down here!" Johanna shouts.
The lights turn in their direction, and the massive vehicle whirs towards them.
"I see three: Mockingjay, the 2 woman, 7 woman," says one voice, though Enobaria can barely hear it over the engine.
"We've got company! There's no time. We've gotta get out of here!"
"We can't leave-"
"If we stay, we're all dead."
The hovercraft ascends, and Enobaria can see other lights now, more hovercrafts, more shouting. "You have to kill me," Johanna says, and when Enobaria looks down, there's true panic on her face.
"What?"
"Please hurry. Right now!" Enobaria can feel Johanna's hands trying to free themselves, probably to press down on the dagger at her throat. She tosses it aside. The forcefield has been broken, multiple tributes were just stolen, the Hunger Games are undeniably over, what right does she have to kill Johanna now?
"Please, they'll torture me!" Johanna won't stop struggling, and Enobaria realizes that while previously she had been holding Johanna in place so that she could kill her if needed, she is now holding her still to stop her from killing herself.
"I… can't." It's the truth, and not just in the immediate sense, but overall. The Hunger Games, this Hunger Games especially, was a chain - Katniss killed Gloss so Cashmere tried to kill Katniss, then Johanna killed Cashmere, so Enobaria was supposed to kill Johanna. But Enobaria couldn't kill Johanna, in fact, she hadn't killed anyone at all.
"Fuck you," Johanna curses, but it lacks its normal vitriol, she just looks disappointed. And maybe she should be. Enobaria couldn't stand with Cashmere and Gloss, not truly, nor could she commit to the rebels. She just stood still, hoping that if she didn't do anything at all, neither side would grow any stronger.
Before long, they're both collected by a Capitol hovercraft. She sees several Peacekeepers, and Peeta Mellark, and then she sees nothing, as she is blindfolded.
Enobaria isn't sure what she expected to happen after she was extracted from the 75th Games arena, but she could never predicted what actually happened. When she won her Games the first time, 13 years prior, she was taken to a medical bay where she was patched up, then all of the grime was cleaned off of her, she was given lovely, clean clothes, and plenty of food and water.
None of that happened. A peacekeeper medic checked the large gash on her hip and gave her some ointment to make sure it wouldn't get infected, then wrapped it in gauze, and sent her on her way, no sutures, no anti-scarring treatments. She was sent, in all her filth, in all her hunger and dehydration, to some underground cell, where the floor was dirt and the walls were a poured concrete, with iron bars on the front.
Across from her is Peeta, she can see him sitting in the corner of his cell, knees to his chest, afraid to look at her. Next to him is Johanna. Enobaria can't see her within her cell unless Johanna is on the right side of it, and Johanna seems to know this, as she hides in the back of her cell. Inexplicably, the cell next to Enobaria is occupied by Annie Cresta, who won the 70th Hunger Games. Enobaria doubts her treason against the Capitol, which makes her think them being here will be some sort of torment against the escapees, that they'll be filmed or something. It makes her think that at least Katniss, Finnick, and Haymitch are out somewhere, with the rebels. And it makes her wonder if Brutus is there, or Lyme, or if her being down in this dungeon is just an unfortunate accident.
She wonders where there is, where the rebel base is. But she's glad she doesn't know anything, based on the fact that they're spending most of the time interrogating Peeta and Johanna about the rebel plot. At least, that's what she thinks they're doing, until she sees Peeta after one of his sessions, muttering to himself in his cell.
"They got to her, they replaced her, she's a mutt… a mutt."
"She's not a mutt, you love her," Johanna says, finally coming to the front of her cell. "That's just the Capitol trying to worm into your brain." Johanna's hair has been buzzed off, and there are scabs on the back of her knuckles, Enobaria can see, where she's grabbing the bars.
Johanna backs up as the Peacekeepers come down the corridor, tossing their meals into the cells. It's the same every time - some sort of gruel, and a ration bar that Enobaria assumes has protein, and a little vitamin pill. She doesn't know how often they arrive, sometimes it seems like they come only a couple hours apart, and sometimes it seems like she's starving before the next one arrives, but there's no windows or clocks, so it's impossible to say.
Sometimes they take her out of her cell to ask her if she knew anything was happening during the Games, if she knew anything about the alliance, if she had anything to do with the forcefield breaking. They sit her in a dark room, shouting questions at her, making her wonder if she'll ever be allowed out of there. They threaten her with electric shocks, once going to far as to attach the electrodes to her skin. They bring people in the room with her - like Annie, threatening harm to Annie if she doesn't answer them truthfully. When she is finally allowed back into her cell, she ignores her meal, preferring just to sleep.
Sometimes they take Annie Cresta, though she doesn't know what they could possibly have to ask her. Annie doesn't speak to her, and Enobaria doesn't know what to say to her - she never returned to the Capitol after her Games. Occasionally, Johanna will move to the front of her cell to talk to Annie, quietly, gently. Annie shouts, stomps, repeats herself in such a way that Enobaria realizes she can't be faking her madness.
Johanna shoves something across the hallway that divides her cell and Annie's, and Enobaria can't figure out what it is at first, but then Johanna explains. "It's just a long piece of my shirt. But you can use it, to tie knots. Finnick says it used to help?"
They take Johanna the most often, kicking and screaming enough that they have to drag her out. Enobaria can hear her screaming, can hear distantly the shouts of whoever is torturing her, and she wonders if Johanna was right, if dying in the arena would have been better than whatever this is. They return her soaking wet, sometimes carrying her unconscious back to her cell.
Eventually, Johanna stops coming forward in her cell. The meals go uneaten, and even Annie's calls for her go unanswered. Peeta continues to mutter, Annie ties her knots, and Enobaria wonders how much time has possibly passed since the Games. Days? Weeks?
They come for her once again, but this time, it's different. It's gentler, more official looking Peacekeepers, and they lead her around a corner and up a flight of stairs. Before she exits, they blindfold her, and then lead her down a corridor, and then another. She's sat in a cart of some sort, and then driven somewhere. She thinks they're still underground, but can't be sure. Once they stop, she is taken into another building, and then her blindfold is removed.
It's the train station. Her heart leaps, thinking of her family, wondering if her mother, her sister, her brother are alright. One of the Peacekeepers pushes her forward, and then she sees Calpurnia. "Enobaria, my goodness, it's really you!" There are tears in her eyes, and Enobaria thinks of Cashmere, realizing with shock that she hasn't thought of her in some time.
She nods, tentatively moving forward. The Peacekeepers make no move to stop her, and she assumes she's being released into Calpurnia's care. "We need to get you out of the Capitol while they're still allowing it."
"What is going on?" She has a million questions and doesn't know where to start.
"It was a negotiation - your freedom in exchange for certain Capitol concessions. Hurry up, I'll explain on the train."
The train Enobaria is ushered onto with Calpurnia is not the train to 2, but the train towards 1. She is weak, from poor nutrition, from days on days of no movement and not enough water and sleep deprivation, and she has no idea what happened at the Hunger Games and what ended up of the rebel plot, so she has no idea why this is. Did District 2 still exist? She slumps into the seat, knowing that just getting away from the Capitol should be enough, but as the train starts to move, she can feel the distance between herself and her home grow, somewhere deep in her bones.
"District 13 still exists," Calpurnia starts, leaning in towards Enobaria. They're the only ones in the whole train car, but she still speaks quietly. "It's where the rebels fled to, where they're operating from."
Calpurnia hands Enobaria a bottle of water from her bag, and Enobaria drinks from it greedily. She also lays out a sandwich on the table. "13?"
Calpurnia nods. "It's underground, very top secret. District 1 is largely in rebel control at this point, as is 3, 4, 8, and 11."
"And 2?"
"District 2 is a very special case," Calpurnia says. "It's not unlike a civil war there right now. I'm not sending you there now, because you're extremely weak and you have not shown dedication to the rebel or loyalist cause. Additionally… there have been reports of mobs killing past Victors in protest lately. And well, that was one of the conditions of your release."
Enobaria opens her mouth to protest, and then closes it again. She is weak right now. If she did go to 2, she doesn't know which side she'd support. She takes a bite of the sandwich instead. It's delicious. "What happened at the end of the Games?"
"You, Johanna Mason, and Peeta Mellark were taken into Capitol custody. Katniss Everdeen, Finnick Odair, and Beetee Latier were taken by the rebels. Chaff and Brutus were killed in the fighting."
Enobaria nods, processing this. She had come to accept that Brutus was dead over the course of her time in that Captiol dungeon, but to hear it aloud, to hear it with certainty was different. She, Cashmere, Gloss, and Brutus were an alliance, and now she is the only one left. "And… why are we going to 1?"
Calpurnia shakes her head. "I'm going to 1. I have business to attend to, personally, and for Cashmere. But 1 is very unstable right now, and they're also in the habit of killing Victors. I want you to live, Enobaria. We worked to negotiate with the Capitol, to get you out of that prison, so that you can survive to the end of this. You have to stay safe, so you should go stay on the train, all the way to 7."
The idea of just sitting out the war feels absurd to Enobaria, but she doesn't know what else to do. She fought in the Hunger Games, she isn't a soldier. And as she is right now, she'd be killed in a moment. She decides to stay on the train, to try out 7, to at least make good on the effort that Calpurnia put forth to extract her from the prison. But her family is still in 2, and she needs to find out how they are doing, so she will have to find a way to contact them, at least.
Enobaria does as Calpurnia says, and takes the train until its terminal stop in District 7. When she gets off, she's aware of how she appears: filthy, malnourished, probably smelling terrible, and arriving well after sundown with nothing but the rather tattered clothes on her back.
But there's a woman on the platform even so. "Enobaria?" she asks. She's not very tall, and a little stooped, even though she isn't elderly, with a clear, round face and sandy colored hair. She smiles pleasantly at Enobaria's nod. "My name is Mayellen, I'm one of the council-members of District 7."
"You knew I was coming?"
Mayellen nods. "I received word day before yesterday. Come on with me. Can you walk?"
Enobaria nods, because of course she can walk, but she finds when she actually goes to do it, it takes more effort than she expects. But she thinks she hides it well enough, following Mayellen through District 7 under cover of darkness. 7 is vaguely familiar to her from her Victory Tour, though that was years and years ago, now. She smells the sawdust, the lumber, the tobacco, and she sees the forests around the village, extending seemingly endlessly, perfect squares cut down, and perfect squares with new saplings growing to replace them. But it's dark, so she can't really grasp the essence of the village, the character of the houses, the type of people who live here, the mood.
As they pass through the town center, she sees a gallows, with a man hanging in them. He's stiff, as if he's been dead for some time. "Oh, don't look at him," Mayellen says. Once they're clear, she adds in a hushed voice. "That's Jackson, our last Victor. He was throwing a fuss about Johanna, and the Peacekeepers did that to him, to send a message."
Enobaria now wishes she had looked a little harder, to see what the other Victor from 7 - the one she had never met - had looked like. "She's alive," she says.
Mayellen stops abruptly, though she doesn't turn around. Enobaria wonders if she regrets taking in Enobaria, when she could have tried to work with Calpurnia for the rescue of her own District's Victor. "You saw her?"
"Yes." Enobaria is frightened. She doesn't know if 7 will protect her, exactly, or just use her as a negotiation piece with the Captiol or the rebels, so she doesn't want to give too many details, but she can see the relief in Mayellen in how her shoulders sag. It doesn't match Johanna's 'there's no one I care about' persona at all.
"Oh, Anna, what have you gotten into?" she asks, shaking her head, and then she leads them into a small house at the end of the main road.
She shows Enobaria to a bath at the back of the house, and once they heat water, Enobaria washes for the first time in weeks, at least. The water turns gray, and Mayellen brings her fresh water to rinse with. Enobaria washes her hair but leaves the braids in place, as ratty as they've become, since she lacks the skills to improve them. She picks the dirt from under her nails, then brushes them, then clips them short again. She brushes her teeth. She looks at the scars she has from the Games - her first scars since she was a child - she was so used to the Capitol disappearing them all away.
After, Mayellen gives her clean clothes, and they eat a meal together. It's simple, but delicious, since after so many days of gruel and ration bars, even root vegetables, broth, and beans taste good. She is shown to a cot in the back of the house, near a wood stove. The stove is off, since it's summer, but she likes the smell - wood and ash. She sleeps like she's dead.
Mayellen invites a woman over a couple days after Enobaria arrives. Her name is Justinia, and she tells Enobaria she's going to fix her braids. Her hair seems like such a minor concern compared to anything else that she almost declines, but she catches her reflection on a steel container in the kitchen and changes her mind.
Justinia has swift, sure hands, and she unpicks Seeder's braids with speed and precision. It's uncomfortable, but that's because Enobaria was in the Hunger Games and a dungeon in these braids, rather than Justinia's skill. "These were put in with care," Justinia says. She's older, maybe 50 years old, and her voice is a little raspy, but peaceful to listen to.
Enobaria nods, then realizes this makes her hair tug more. "She was from 11. I guess it's a skill there."
Justinia laughs. "Yes, definitely not a skill here in 7, I realized that when I moved, so I taught myself."
Enobaria almost turns around. "You moved here?"
"Yes, you ever hear of anyone in 7 named Justinia? I'm from 2."
Enobaria is speechless, but she wishes she could turn, to see this woman's face. To see is they resemble each other. To see when she was last back. To see how she left, why she left. She wonders if the braids were just an excuse, if Mayellen really just wanted them to meet.
"How? Why?" she asks, her questions coming out in monosyllabic stutters.
"They asked me to do things, in the Nut, that I could not accept. I heard that District 13 was real, and I tried to escape there, but some things happened… I was lucky to end up in 7. They call me Justine, they pretend I was born here."
"Didn't they look for you, after you left?" Enobaria asks. "What if a Peacekeeper recognizes you?"
She laughs a little. "There are dozens, if not hundreds of deserters every year. It's impossible for them to keep track of them all. They might actually look for me around 13, but they aren't looking for me here, of all places. Though I keep my head down around our newest Peacekeeper."
"You don't have any contact with them, do you?" she asks.
"With 2? No. That was the trade. I had to abandon my whole life."
"My family… I don't know if they're alright."
Justinia sighs. "They cut communications. The rebels did. No one here has a phone line anymore, and the rebels took over the train also. So it's impossible to connect to 2. The only one who can communicate with 2 is the Peacekeeper, since he has official Capitol equipment. He's still stationed here since well, most people in 7 aren't actually rebels or loyalists, they just want to avoid a war. But he's more severe than any Peacekeeper we've had before. You saw the body in the square. So he won't be granting any favors."
"I'd have to break in."
"I wouldn't advise it." Justinia runs her hand on Enobaria's last braid to ensure there's no frizz, and then shows her her reflection in a handmirror. "But if you do go, his little guard station is the building to the left of the gallows. Dark green with white edging."
Enobaria waits until Mayellen is asleep before she leaves, long past midnight. The night is not silent in 7 - there are sounds of crickets from the stands of trees, and the din of people still drinking in the pubs. Occasionally she will pass a person or two smoking out in an alleyway, but they pay her no mind. It seems to be the way of life in 7 to mind your own business, or perhaps, in the current political climate, keeping your head down is the way to survive.
She's feeling much better than when she arrived, with several days of good meals and several nights of good sleep, but she can tell that the time in the the Capitol prison took its toll. She is on edge always, awakening with a startle, and she feels thinner, smaller, like they took something from her that she can never get back even by eating well. She was no rebel, but they still kept her there, they interrogated her, they left her to rot…
Tonight, she only carries a cooking knife. Mayellen didn't have many things that worked as weapons aside from hatches and axes, and Enobaria never trained on how to use those effectively.
She finds the guard house easily enough, and it's empty. She sneaks in, hunching down below the window, and spots the telephone. She knows a few numbers by heart, but panics, wondering who to call, who it's safe to call. She grabs the phone and lowers it to the ground, reaching up and dialing slowly, ensuring she makes no mistakes, remembering to include the District code, since she's in 7.
Her sister-in-law picks up. "Hello?" she asks, nervously.
"Antonia?"
"E-Enobaria?" her voice is shaking, barely above a whisper, and Enobaria isn't prepared for the emotion of hearing the voice of family after so long.
"Hi."
"You're alive!"
"Yes."
"Where are you?"
She pauses, wondering if she should say. "I can't come back right now," she says.
Antonia pauses as well. "Of course. In fact, please don't. They'll capture you right away if you do."
Enobaria doesn't know if 'they' refers to the rebels or the loyalists, but she trusts her sister-in-law's opinion of the situation. "How is Tullus?"
Antonia sighs. "Tullus and Tamora are both dead. Baria, things are really bad here right now. The rebels bombed the Nut."
"What about my mom? What about the girls?" She can feel her chest seizing with panic.
"The girls are safe with me. Your mom… I'm sorry, Baria, she didn't make it."
Enobaria sighs. Her mouth is painfully dry. "I should come back. I could do something."
"They killed that boy, the one who won the 73rd Games, right in the square. And Lyme, the rebel, was killed in the bombing of the Nut. It's not a good place for Victors right now. I promise me and the girls are safe. Just… come back after this is all over."
"Yeah, of course."
Enobaria sees a shadow approach the guard booth, and realizes there's someone looking inside. "Antonia, I've got to go. Don't call this number again. I love you."
She hangs up, standing, hand on the knife, just below her shirt. The door opens, and the Peacekeeper is standing there, a baton in his hand. He is young, but he looks angry, ready to strike. "Who are you?" he asks, and she sees it, the recognition in his eyes. She shouldn't be here, in District 7, let alone using his phone in the guard booth.
She tries to see a way to get out of this without killing him, but no matter how she figures it, he will report her presence in 7 to the Capitol as soon as she escapes. "They're torturing them, right now, in a dungeon in the Capitol," she says, as fast as she can. "Peeta Mellark and Johanna Mason."
He scoffs, laughing a bit. "Is that what you were telling someone? Peeta was just on television last week telling everyone how the Mockingjay was tricked by the rebels. And both were kidnapped by the rebels in some sort of violent attack. God, I thought you were from 2 also. They really did get to you with that rebel propaganda, didn't they?"
"I can't go back!" she shouts. She doesn't want to beg, but she's fucked men she's despised, she's done worse.
He chuckles in a way that feels oddly paternal, even though he might be younger than her. "Your fears are in your head. They're just rebel lies."
As he passes her to pick up the phone, presumably to call the Capitol and report her presence in 7, she grabs the knife, stabbing him in the back. She wonders how he recognized her as a Victor and left himself so unprotected, but it isn't worth dwelling on, she just stabs him again and again, until he's decidedly dead. She had thought at the end of the Games, and on the train, that she couldn't kill anyone anymore, but perhaps she was wrong. Now, she hopes she is really finished.
As she steps out of the guard booth, there are a few men exiting the pub, and the bloody woman with the knife in hand catches their attention. One of the men raises his hands in surrender, while another rests his hand on a hatchet on his belt. Enobaria drops her knife on the ground. She falls to her knees, hands raised.
One of the men walks behind her, kicking her knife further away as he passes her. He checks the guard booth. "Marius is dead!" He returns, smacking her on the back heartily. "Come on, girl, you need a drink."
She makes a life in 7, more or less. She helps them bury the Victor, Jackson, but they are isolated from the war. There is very little communication, until eventually, someone comes from 3 and restores the television service. They catch up on what they've missed: the rise of District 13, the revelation of the exploitation of the Victors, the bombings in 8, 12, and 2, the takeover of communications and transportation by the rebels.
Enobaria has no skills that really help District 7. She is terrible with an axe, and the paper mills have machinery that moves so fast it would take weeks to train her. But thanks to her time in the Capitol, she's spent more than her fair share of time in a bar, so she barmaid takes her on in the pub, and she's there each afternoon and evening, pouring drinks, clearing tables, making conversation.
Almost no one in 7 has ever left the district, so they all have questions for her: about the Games, about the Capitol, about District 2. She doesn't mind answering them, she finds. She especially likes talking about her home. She doesn't know what she'll return to, so it's nice to remember it how it was, to talk about the massive quarries and the beautiful stone structures.
But one day, the phone in the guard booth rings, and it's for her, a summons. The war has ended, and they want all the Victors there for Snow's assassination. Mayellen puts a hand on Enobaria's shoulder when she tells her. "We'll look for you on the television. And remember, you can always come back here."
So she goes, back on a train, and still she can't go back to 2. It's frustrating, to go in the right direction, but to be forced to get off early, in the place she might hate most in the world. She is met by a rebel soldier who treats her with some suspicion, as well as Peeta Mellark. He nods at her, a rather formal greeting, but she doesn't mind it, she doesn't really know what she'd say to him anyways. But there is something there, something she doesn't share with Katniss, or any of the District 13 soldiers - the understanding of that time in the Capitol, a shared suffering.
They walk back to Snow's mansion, and Peeta finally starts to speak on the walk. "Katniss is at the house. She's not well - her sister was killed in the last bombing, and Katniss was burned fairly badly. Haymitch, Johanna, and Annie should be arriving later today from 13. And Finnick is here as well, though he's also injured."
"How are you?" It's a strange question, because there's no good answer. They're all doing poorly, but Peeta offers her a kind smile.
"I'm doing better now that I know this is coming to an end," he offers. "And now that I'm back in my right mind."
She nods. She can picture him in the prison cell, muttering nonsense, whatever bullshit they tortured him with running rampant in his veins. "Can I go home after this?" She knows Peeta isn't in charge of this exactly, but he has been here, in the Capitol, he might know.
"I think so," he says. "We should be able to go wherever we want after this."
When she sees Johanna, she isn't prepared. Like herself, like Peeta, Johanna looks permanently smaller after the Capitol, like some of herself will always be left there. Enobaria wants to tell her about Jackson, about Mayellen and Justinia, about how she worked as a barmaid in the village where Johanna was raised, but she can't, the words are stuck in her throat.
She wonders if she and Johanna are cursed, if she should have learned her lesson years and years ago, when Johanna and she were involved in that terrible night that got Enobaria's father killed. But still, she's drawn like a moth to the flame, so when Johanna asks for tobacco, she shows her where she found it, hours before, and when Johanna offers her a cigarette, she accepts.
Watching Johanna smoke, she's reminded a bit of Cashmere, and the memory hurts so badly. She wants to shake Johanna, ask her if it was really necessary to kill Cashmere, and if so, did she have to do so that violently? And at the same time, she wants to hold Johanna, to anchor herself, to tell Johanna that things will be alright and perhaps in doing so, reassure herself. She feels ridiculous, having so many thoughts about a woman who probably vacillates between hating her and not caring about her at all, but what other constant in her life was there but cruelty?
They finish the conversation with everything left unsaid, but it's alright. Somehow, sharing the cigarette seems to be an olive branch. Johanna is older now, tired. She doesn't have energy to expend hating Enobaria, anymore. Not with everyone dead. Enobaria kicks her shin gently as she leaves. She wonders if it's the last time she'll see Johanna Mason. Wonders if she should have kissed her just once.
After the chaos of the assassination, after the war is well and truly over, Enobaria finally makes it home. She doesn't recognize 2. The distinctive mountain that held the Nut has collapsed, the shape of the landscape changed. And the city itself is rubble, stone buildings in pieces.
She finds Antonia and her nieces in their same old apartment, the building miraculously mostly unscathed despite the rubble around it, but they're about the only familiar parts of District 2. She stays with them, going into town to take a job at one of the bars.
It's funny, a Hunger Games Victor, daughter of a stone mason, taking a job pouring drinks. But she likes it well enough. She's good at it, even. She likes to hear about the people rebuilding, about the new president, about people who come and go from other Districts. She sees Gale Hawthorne, Katniss's friend, after a month or so. And a couple weeks after that, she sees Justinia.
When she moves out, it's initially too quiet. At first, she startles from her sleep again. But she eventually, she begins to adjust to her new life. It's nice to have an unchanging routine: wake late morning, take a walk, to go see the old quarry, or to visit her nieces if it is a weekend, then report to work where she stays almost til midnight.
Recently, she's realized that art is not banned in 2 anymore. She's tried drawing after work. She's incredibly bad at it, but her mind is overflowing with ideas, so she'll sit at her table, sketching. Slowly, day by day, she can see herself improving. And she likes it. It's nice to do something just because she can. To be bad at something with no consequences. To create something that no one wants from her.
She hates July, can feel herself becoming anxious as the weather becomes hotter, as the time of the Hunger Games approaches, even though she knows she doesn't need to go to the Capitol. And she hates being indoors too long, since she might trigger a memory of the weeks in that Capitol prison. She can feel the weight of grief even more in July, it seems, her family and Cashmere and Gloss and Brutus, dozens of tributes and friends from her district lost in the war. She finds it unbearable to be inside, to be alone. So she takes to drawing on the riverbank, trying to while away some time and keep her mind occupied.
When a woman comes to sit nearby, Enobaria feels nervous - her drawings are still amateurish at best - but she doesn't put them away, she's allowed to be here, after all. The woman is missing an arm, Enobaria notices, probably from the war, and she has a very pretty face. Enobaria tries not to get distracted by her as she finishes her sketch, but fails miserably. She always did have a weakness for beautiful women. And when the woman appears the next day as well, Enobaria thinks that this might be alright, a new routine to replace her old July, something completely different she could not have imagined before.