The finale has arrived. Yes we are at the end but that opens the door for the next one. I will be posting chapter one of my next story shortly so I hope you will join me on that journey once again. Thank you for all the support like always and I hope you enjoy the final chapter.

"I'll take the challenge! But first, dinner!" He pushes Katniss into another set of goons. "We can't do this on empty stomachs!" He smiles brightly before he gestures for his goons to follow with their hostages in tow. They enter into a marvelously decorated dining room. They might actually appreciate it's beauty if the imminent danger they were facing wasn't looming over their heads. "Sit!" They slam Peeta into one of the chairs. He reaches for Katniss but she's taken to the other side to sit opposite him.

A whole line of women, dressed in long dresses that were topped off in hoods, walk out with a variety of foods in their arms. They litter the huge dining room table with all of it, making it look like a feast was about to ensue. They all stand just on the side of the room between several of the goons. Crane takes a seat at the head of the table.

"Let's dig in!" He says as he serves himself. Peeta watches Katniss from across the table. All he wanted to do was reach for her, touch her, hold her hand, keep her from harm and she'd decided the best way to do that was to walk right into this mess. He willed her to look at him but she was frantically searching the table for something.

Katniss was looking for a weapon but everywhere she looked, there was nothing. No forks, knives, not even a butter knife. Maybe she could fashion something; accidentally break a plate and use a sharp piece to slit Crane's throat. She grabs her napkin, eyeing it curiously. Maybe she could create a rope and strangle him with it. Katniss turns her eyes to their host. He still has his gun, which would be faster than anything she could think up.

"Forgive me but I couldn't have anyone trying to end this party so soon..." Crane says while dangling, almost flaunting, his fork in front of them. That addressed the lack of silverware. He looks to the two of them who haven't touched their food. "Eat!" His yelling startles them both out of their thoughts. "It's rude to look a gift horse in the mouth...now, eat!" This time, he places his gun on the table to emphasize his seriousness.

Katniss and Peeta both sigh as they grab a few things from the setting and place it on their plates. They pretty much end up with the same spread, fruits only. They couldn't really go for the roast pig with no utensils, not they were very hungry to begin with.

"That's it..." He takes a sip of his wine. "You two are into the healthy foods, huh?" He shrugs. "Figures. I mean...you used to be a cop and you're his wife," he gestures to the two of them absentmindedly. "He probably influenced you."

Peeta and Katniss sit in silence, picking at their fruit, exchanging worried glances. Crane just sat at the head of the table, eating like nothing was wrong and even continuing his one-sided conversation. But the closer he got to emptying his plate, the closer they got to whatever ending Crane had to this game. When he finishes, sighing appreciatively, they think it's about that time, until another woman walks into the room with more food.

"Ah...dessert!" Crane exclaims. The woman drops off a pie right in front of him. She turns to leave when he pulls her into his lap. "Aren't you going to serve us?" She tries to stand but he keeps her in place. He looks to Katniss and Peeta. "This one's my favorite. So feisty! Has a fire in her, like you." He looks to Katniss. "You see this?" He turns his head so they can see a perfectly round bruise on the side. "She did this." Crane leans into her ear and whispers something to her that only she can hear. She struggles against him making him laugh. "Now, serve us!" He finally releases her, slapping her behind as she walks away.

The woman cuts a slice for him, then one for Katniss and Peeta. She drops off Katniss' then makes her way over to Peeta.

"Look at her!" Crane demands. Peeta's glaring at him defiantly but he slowly turns his head up to the woman. Peeta has to stop himself from doing a double take. He only stares at her as nonchalantly as possible. "Don't get too close. She'll bite you!" Crane jokes. The woman freezes as she turns away. She turns back to Peeta, dropping into his lap and kissing him soundly.

A plate drops across from him. Peeta and the mystery woman look in Katniss' direction, who glares at them. The whole interaction entertains Crane as he lets out a boisterous laugh.

"Maybe I'll just let your wife kill you and I'll watch..." Crane says.

But that wasn't the real reason she broke the plate; it wasn't even to manufacture that shank she'd thought up of earlier. The woman had planned it perfectly; almost like she was giving her the time to figure everything out.

Something was off about the pie and her act had given her that time. The whole thing gave Katniss a reason for breaking the plate; it was a call for Peeta's attention. Now that Peeta was trying to placate Katniss from across the table, she quickly looks between the pie and him, hoping that he'll take the hint. Peeta narrows his eyes before he stares at the pie.

Flashback

"I like this! I think you chose the best house!" He yells back to her. "I've never even seen this! Did you know this was here?" Peeta examines the abundant forest they had just in their back yard. Katniss walks up to him with their one year old on her hip.

"I did actually." She smiles big at him. "I was hoping that one day, maybe our baby would love it out here as much as I do." Katniss looks at little Maddy.

"But you weren't pregnant then..."

"I know."

"So you did trap me?!" Peeta exclaims.

"Yep!" She walks up next to him and kisses him on the cheek. "I love you..."

"Yea, yea..." He continues walking until he finds a bush with berries on it. He picks a few, examining them curiously. He's smelling them when he calls to Katniss. "Are these edible?" She walks up behind him, slapping them out of his hands. "Hey-"

"Oh my god! Did you eat any of it?! Oh my god, Peeta?!" She grabs his face with her free hand, eyeing him in concern.

"I didn't!" She drops her head in a sigh.

"Thank god!" She hugs him tightly with her free arm.

"So...they're not edible?" Peeta asks.

"That's Nightlock, Peeta! If you ate it, you'd be dead in a minute!"

"Geez, okay..." He wipes his hands on his pants.

"Peeta, you have to get rid of it." She hikes Maddy higher on her hip.

"What?"

"That!" She points to the bush.

"How?!"

"I don't know. I don't care! If Maddy gets out here and accidentally puts one in her mouth..." Peeta hears her voice breaking. He kisses Maddy then kisses Katniss on the lips.

"I'll take care of it."

"Soon?"

"Today. I'll get someone out here today to rip this out and pick off all the berries."

"They're going to pick the ones up off the ground too?"

"I don't care how much it costs. I'll take care of it." He grabs her hand and leads her back towards the house.

Nightlock. It what was in the pie. It's why Johanna had kissed him and whispered to him to not eat it. He had to try so hard to not blow her cover. She was Haymitch's inside man. With Crane's display earlier, Peeta could only imagine what she'd gone through during this assignment.

So now all they had to do was wait for Crane to eat his dessert. But then what? His armed guards were still scattered around the room. If Crane fell, they'd panic and then what? They might try to finish the job anyway.

They both try, as discretely as possible to glance at Crane who was popping cherries into his mouth. He sticks a fork in the pie, brings it up to his lips but freezes short of actually ingesting it. His eyes focus on a spot on the table.

What happens next, happens simultaneously. A shot goes off, killing one of his guards. Crane grabs his gun and flips half the table. He turns towards the window, aiming his gun outside. Everyone is shooting as Peeta jumps over the table taking Katniss down with him. He flips the half of the table that didn't turn over with Crane's initial attempt so they have a barricade for themselves.

"Peeta?! What's happening?!" She yells over all the gunfire.

"Haymitch's friends never have any control!" He lets her go, eyeing a gun a few meters away. Katniss grabs his forearm slamming him back into the table. "What?"

"What are you doing?!" He points to the weapon.

"No! No way! It's too dangerous!"

"Well, what do you expect me to do?! Wait for them to shoot us?! This table won't hold!" Katniss covers his mouth and points slightly to her left. He turns his eyes towards one of the guards that's advancing, obliviously, towards them. His rifle jams causing him to hit it in frustration. It was the distraction he needed to act but Katniss has other plans.

She whips out the knife she has tucked in her boot and stabs the guard's foot which steps right next to her hand. The man's reaction is to bend over to reach for his foot. Peeta grabs the man in a chokehold, pulling him down into him. He doesn't let up the pressure until the man's lifeless body lays in his arms.

"A knife?! You had a knife the whole time?!" Peeta berates.

"I forgot!"

"You for-" He cuts himself off with a groan as he searches the man for a weapon. He manages to find a handgun but the clip is empty. "Who has a gun with no ammo?!" A bullet goes through the table just shy of missing his head.

"He has ammo!" Katniss points out.

"You think?!" He shows her his hand. "Your knife!" She hands it to him. Thankfully, the man who shot his way gets side tracked by several agents that make their way into the room. He ducks down behind some cover, firing more shots. Peeta watches the man release his mag to reload. Peeta stands and throws the knife which catches the man in the neck, causing the bullets to scatter to the floor. "Damn it! I have to get that!"

"No!"

"Katniss! Trust me!" She shakes her head defiantly.

"Let your people handle it!" But the agents who've made their way in are either already dead or were forced into cover. The snipers outside could only help if they had shots which they didn't at the moment. His people needed help and he wasn't going to sit there and wait for backup to come when it's too late.

"Katniss," he grabs her face. "Nothing's going to happen to me!" Katniss grabs his collar, crashing his lips onto hers.

"Promise me, Peeta!" He kisses her hard.

"I promise."

The moment she releases him, Peeta scrambles behind the cover where the bullets dropped. He loads the mag, then reloads the gun. He leans against cover and looks over to one of the wounded agents. He makes a gesture which tells Peeta that there are two armed men left and one of them was still Crane. The agent raises his gun, at first Peeta thinks it's at him. But when he fires and one of the guards falls dead next to him, he sighs in relief. He turns to the agent but he's lifeless. Unfortunately, the shot gives his position away to the one person who's left.

"Oh, Peeta!" He hears him shout. "Come out! It's not like I don't know where you are!" He shoots a shot that bounces on the floor next to where he's sitting. "Or should I just go for your kryptonite..." Peeta peaks enough to see him aim the gun towards Katniss. He pops out, gun trained on Crane, instantly.

"Alright! You got me! I'll take my shot!" Peeta narrows his eye.

"And I, mine." He still has his gun trained on the turned over table. "By the time you get your shot off, she'll be dead." Sure, it wasn't at Katniss but the bullet would rip right through it and into Katniss. "You want to play a game?"

"I'm tired of your games, Crane!" He aims his gun at Peeta instead.

"Come on...Rule change! I get a shot, then you. Like...Russian Roulette. If you win, you both go home. If I, well..." He shrugs then chuckles. "I hear you have quiet the track record." They both have their guns trained on one another but Peeta wasn't going to play anymore games; it was now or never. Unfortunately, they're both thinking the same thing because simultaneous shots go off, leaving Peeta and Crane laying on the ground, motionless.

"No!" Katniss should care but she doesn't as she runs out of cover to check on Peeta. She turns him to see blood dripping from the side of his head. Peeta stirs with a groan as she caress the wound.

"I'm okay." He says, pushing her hand away to stand.

"You got shot in the head!" He wipes off the blood.

"Flesh wound." He helps her up to her feet. They turn their attention to the groan that elicits from Crane's direction. He turns, pressing on the gunshot wound that's pierced his shoulder.

Peeta aims his gun again, contemplating killing him. He should but everything he was taught as a cop, went against that. He couldn't just kill him despite everything he'd done. He'd have to trust in the justice system sometime, right? Unless, Crane raised his gun; then it would be self-defense.

Crane groans some more clutching at the wound. He chuckles to himself, eyeing his gun which fell a few feet away. He's not thinking anything other than killing them both but when he reaches for his gun, a crippling pain hits his chest. He tries to breathe but it's suddenly become difficult. He turns to Peeta.

"What did you do to me?!" He clutches his chest as he begins to turn purple. Peeta opens his hand, dropping several squished nightlock berries.

"If you hadn't used hollow points, maybe they wouldn't have accidentally gotten mixed in." Crane opens his mouth to say something but he only gasps before he passes out.

Several agents storm in suddenly. They freeze when they see no threats. Haymitch walks through to them.

"Of course, now you show up!" Katniss tells him. "It's just like on TV! You get here when it's over!" Peeta pulls her into him.

"Hey! We took care of the rest of his goon squad!" He looks at Peeta, eyeing the blood on his head. "What happened there?"

"Shot."

"Again?!" He radios in a medic who's there almost instantly. "One on him." He points to Crane. "And one on you!" He points at Peeta. "What? Did they put a metal plate in your head?!"

"No-Ow!" He groans as the medic works. "Crane is a shitty shot." Speaking of which, Peeta turns to look at the medic that's working on him. He turns to them, signaling that he's dead.

"Damn. You two always kill the bad guy." Haymitch says.

"I'm sorry, did you want him alive? You really should have specified that in the job description." Peeta says.

"Off the record, I wanted him dead. Worse than dead! I wanted to beat the shit out of him, personally!"

"And on the record?" Katniss asks.

"I needed to question him; debrief him as to why and for full disclosure of all his actions. Maybe see if he has any sons..."

"Sorry." Katniss scoffs. "But he deserved it."

"I didn't mean to kill him." Peeta starts. "I shot him in the shoulder."

"He's right." The medic speaks out. "Bullet to the left shoulder. Weird that he'd die from that..." He examines. "I'll find out more during the autopsy."

They'd debriefed Peeta for hours; at least hours longer then they did Katniss. It was different for Peeta, they had explained; he had motive to commit murder. That word scared her instantly. Murder meant jail time to her. But there were two sides to every story.

Why wouldn't Peeta want to kill him? Crane had tried to murder, not only him, but his wife and daughter. He'd put him in a coma; separated him from his family, his life. He had every reason to intentionally kill him, but would he?

But then again, being in Crane's compound was a life or death situation. Surely self-defense would be the outcome. Katniss could only sit and wait for whatever conclusion was come to.

Murder was the FBI's burden to prove. But Haymitch was the director. He'd never pursue criminal charges. Then again, he was a cop and justice was his primary pursuit.

The initial cause of death was bullet to the left shoulder. That had changed after the autopsy; death from poison, specifically nightlock. Peeta could come out and tell them that Johanna had that all planned with the pie, but he'd never rat her out like that. He knew that Crane more than deserved what he got. Peeta had been through hell and Johanna's was probably no different. Her plan wouldn't fit with their time of death anyway.

What officially ended the debriefing was proof in favor of Peeta. The bullet they retrieved from Crane had no fingerprints on it, which meant that Peeta hadn't tampered with it. It was weird for him when they revealed that fact because he'd touched every one of those bullets when he loaded the clip. Another fact he wasn't privy to was the fact that Nightlock acts as an acid thus, not allowing for a fingerprint to be created. It was the perfect crime.

For Peeta, it was unintentional. When he'd scrambled for the ammo, the bullets were scattered on the floor. Also on the ground, happened to be remnants of their forgotten dessert. The bullets were not only laced but being as they were hollowed out, naturally, the berries found their way to the inside resulting in Crane's death.

"You understand I was just doing my job." Haymitch tries to explain. "Had I not looked into this, I would have been accused of nepotism; of not doing my job."

"I got it, Haymitch. Just...don't call me for a while."

"You're mad?" He groans. "You're really mad now?!"

"Off the record," Peeta whips around in Haymitch's direction. "I wanted to kill him! He could have ruined everything for me! My life, the one I fought so hard to get! The one I've killed for! The one I left you and the FBI to pursue! So yea, there is no one on the planet that wanted him dead more than I did!" He takes a breath. "But I aimed for his right shoulder. I wanted to take him down but everything I've been taught told me to let it ride. Trust in you and our government! But when I was sure he was going to shoot me too, I didn't hesitate."

"You couldn't have known he was going to shoot." Haymitch tries. But Peeta gives him a look that instantly puts him off.

"Just like you didn't know he was going to come after me...or Katniss, right?" Haymitch drops his head. "But...when he shot me, I missed wide, hitting his other shoulder."

"I'm not pursing this any further, Peeta." He places a hand on his shoulder. "His death is officially ruled an...unfortunate casualty."

"Right." Peeta says. "But you might want to look into that son thing. Or sibling thing." Haymitch nods.

"I'll get a family history drawn up immediately."

"Good. Now really...don't call me for a while." He starts walking away.

"Why?! You're still mad?!" Katniss walks out with little Maddy on her heels. When she sees Peeta, she runs for him. Peeta ducks down and picks her up. He kisses her cheek as he takes Katniss into his free arm.

"No, but I think I need to spend some alone time with my family."

"Right." Haymitch chuckles. "I'll...I leave you alone. But I'm not out of the family, right?"

"Unfortunately," Katniss starts. "I don't think you'll leave even if we asked you."

"Hey! What's so bad about me?!" He asks.

"Grandpa's bad?" Maddy asks.

"One day," Katniss tells her. "You'll know what a drunk is." She smiles making Maddy smile too.

"Hey! My job is very stressful!" Haymitch tries. Peeta and Katniss share a laugh as they start to walk away from him.

"So what's first on the list?" Peeta asks.

"On the list?" Katniss asks him.

"We have Christmas right around the corner." He looks at Maddy who hugs her Furby into her. "You still have that list to Santa?" He jostles her gently.

"Mhmm." She kisses Peeta's cheek. "But I have number one on my list."

"Number one?" He looks between her and Katniss. "I thought number one was a brother or sister." He buckles her into her car seat.

"Silly Daddy!" She laughs. "All I want for Christmas is you!" He laughs as Katniss turns him into her and kisses him passionately.

"What are you laughing at?" She asks him.

"Well...first, I had Whitney." He kisses her cheek before reaching for Maddy's cheek. "And now Mariah." He laughs some more. "Definitely your daughter!"

"Yes and..." Katniss says. "You love me, don't you?"

"I do. With all my heart, I do."

"So, do you have a problem with my carbon copy?"

"No, Whitney. I'll always love you and the little one."

"Who's Whitney?" Maddy asks, clearly not getting the inside joke. "That's Mommy!"

"That's right. She is Mommy." He leads her over the passenger side, kissing her hand before he closes the door. When he makes his way back over to his side, he stares at Katniss for awhile.

"What?"

"You know, the next one will be my carbon copy."

"So...operation baby number two is a go?" He smiles big at her.

"Yes, under one condition."

"What's that?"

"I want," he looks back to Maddy who's throughly enthralled with her toy. "I want copious amounts of S-E-X before that." Katniss laughs as she leans over the center console and kisses him deeply.

"How exactly do you think we're going to get this kid?" He smiles at her.

"Yea...you think one day, we'll tell her where she was made?" Katniss narrows her eyes at him. Peeta pats the center console softly. She shoves him away playfully.

"She was not conceived in the car!" She whispers harshly too him.

"You don't know." He says with a chuckle.

"Yea...whatever."

"Too bad she's in the car. We'd go again!"

"But we don't want the leverage."

"We don't?" She shakes her head.

"We're aiming for your doppelgänger this time." Katniss reaches for his hand. "A boy as handsome as his father."

"I wouldn't mind another daughter. If she looks like you guys..." He trails off as he thinks about it. He already had to watch Finnick Jr. Another beautiful girl and he'd be screwed. "Maybe one girl is enough."

"I'm sure!" She laughs as she runs a hand through his hair. Katniss knew exactly what was going through his head as he grips the wheel in thought. He looks at Maddy through his rearview mirror. She looked just like her mother and Katniss was as beautiful as they came. But Maddy had his piercing blue eyes; eyes that could captivate them all. He was going to have to shoo away the boys when Maddy was older; he already knew it.

"Yea...I'm going to need back up." He leans over once again and kisses Katniss. "We have to have a boy." Katniss giggles next to him before she looks back at Maddy.

"Daddy's lost it, sweetie."

"Can we find it?" She asks with a worried expression. They both look over at Peeta who's mumbling to himself.

"We're going to try..."

"Maybe for Christmas!" Maddy cheers.

"Maybe..."

Yes I took some liberty with the forensics. I don't believe nightlock berries are actually real so I figured I could mess with their properties as well. This is fiction anyway. :)