I know, I know, it's been too long... My only excuse is that the RL has been busy lately. BUT, as you can see, I finished the story :)

In case anyone feels leery after I wrote that I might consider writing a sequel with K/H pairing, just to clarify, IF that ever happens, it doesn't change the fact that this story is pretty much romance-free, so you don't have to be afraid that they'll fall into bed in the last chapter ;) It was never meant to happen, anyway, because while it does focus on Katniss and Haymitch's relationship, it's not really about romance, but something else entirely.

That being said, this story is finished, so let me know if you're game for more, because I'm going to think about what to do next.

Thank you all for joining me in this adventure - especially those of you, who took your time to review. It's been a pleasure talking to you :)

I'd also like to once more thank Gonsalsy, who was my Beta for this story, for helping me to improve it and make is more enjoyable for all of you to read.

Of course, I still don't own Hunger Games (I promise to let you know if that ever changes ;) )

...and did I say that this chapter would be shorter? Hah! You must not believe me when I try to predic things like that...

Previously:

He only shook his head.

"You found yourself a piss-poor advisor, sweetheart," she heard him say softly.

"You're the only one I got," she replied, "and I wouldn't trust anyone else, anyway."

"I got everyone I loved killed," he argued matter-of-factly, and she wondered how he could even utter such awful words so calmly.

She swallowed thickly. When she spoke again, her voice was low and raspy:

"Well, then. It's a good thing that you don't make the same mistake twice."

Haymitch raised his head and hesitantly lifted his gaze. When their eyes met, he gave her a look so sad and haunted that any further words Katniss might have wanted to say got caught in her throat. There was a flicker of something, some kind of unintended tenderness that made her jittery, and she looked away like a coward, though she'd been the one to bring it up.

They sat in silence for a long while, the topic thankfully abandoned by unspoken agreement. She should have probably left, but she found that she didn't want to.

"I don't want this for you."

Katniss startled in surprise hearing Haymitch's voice.

"What?" she asked almost inaudibly. "You don't want what?"

He made a vague gesture without even looking at her.

"Any of this."

"Haymitch?"

Despite his earlier complaint about not being drunk enough, she could tell that the fast-consumed alcohol was already going to his head, as his words were becoming slurred. She wasn't sure how much he had really drunk, since he had smashed the first bottle before he could finish downing its contents.

Haymitch shifted in his seat so he could see her better and stared at her so hard that she was starting to get uncomfortable. He tilted his head to the side and while there didn't seem to be any hostility in his face this time, she found that there was something unsettling about the way his half-lidded eyes were gleaming.

"Did I ever tell you, that there was a moment, during your Games, when I thought that maybe it would be best if I stopped helping you?" he said, still watching her thoughtfully. "That, knowing what might happen afterwards... That it would be better for everyone, you included? Less cruel?"

Katniss licked her suddenly dry lips.

"No, I'm pretty sure you never told me that," she said.

She watched fascinated as that gentle thing in his eyes sparkled to life only to turn into something dark, so fast that had she blinked, she might have missed it. It kept twisting back and forth and she couldn't decide if the way he was looking at her was ominous or caring.

"The girl on fire," Haymitch sneered. "Don't you see? The brighter you burned, the more scared for you I got, because what if you did win, huh? What happens next? Never had to worry about that part before. But it just seemed so obvious that they would want to trample you down. Do you have any idea... All the things they could possibly do... You don't know the half of it, do you? But I do. I did. And it made me sick."

There was not much you could say to a confession like that.

"Why didn't you let me die in the arena, then?"

"Because I'm selfish."

She hesitated before asking another question:

"Care to elaborate?"

He stared at her some more making her twitchy.

"The other day, I told you that any tributes you'd get this year would die," he said after a pause, seemingly out of the blue.

"You're changing the subject," she cut in, displeased.

"What I said..." he continued choosing his words slowly, "was not what you wanted to hear at the moment, but it was true."

"How gracious of you to remind me," she muttered.

"There is, however, something I didn't tell you," he said ignoring her grumbling. "Something you should know."

He leaned forward. Perhaps it was the alcohol that made him chatty and that took away some of the habitual harshness, but when he looked at her this time, the hard edge in his eyes was gone and she felt the adrenaline spike again. This was uncharted territory. She didn't know this open Haymitch and she had no idea what to expect from him.

"It's probably going to take a long time," he said. "Years. Decades, even. You're going to lose each one of them, every time. Year after year, they'll die, one by one, despite your best efforts."

"Stop it," she whispered.

"You'll be helpless to watch them run, hide and kill, you'll hear them cry and scream and beg for your help. And you'll keep coming home alone." His eyes were warm and shining with something akin to affection, so much in contradiction to his words, that she wasn't sure if she wasn't seeing things. "But, Katniss..." he raised his hand as if he wanted to touch her cheek, but stopped millimetres away from her skin. She kept completely still. "You'll have to keep trying. If you see a fraction of chance, you'll have to take it, even knowing the risk. Because if you get it right, even once – even after all the failure and pain – it'd be worth it."

She was speechless, once again, because he wasn't talking abstractly.

There it was, that thing Prim had been talking about and Katniss was finally seeing.

You are worth it.

"You're drunk," she blurted, breaking the spell.

Haymitch unexpectedly barked with laughter. She blinked.

"Sure I am," he said drawing back.

His retort made her want to take her words back, but it was too late for that.

"I should go," she said softly after the silence stretched for too long. "My mom will be wondering where I am."

She made no move to leave. She itched to get away from the heavy atmosphere, but at the same time felt like there was something she should tell him before she walked out of his door.

They sat in silence for a spell again, before she sighed and started to get up.

"Katniss," Haymitch said and startled her by quickly putting his hand on her wrist to stop her. His skin was dry and radiating heat, like a stone warmed up by midday sun. She looked at him questioningly. "They won't reap her," he said simply.

She gave into an impulse she didn't know she possessed: she reached with her hand toward his head, kept it hovering for a split second, just like he had done, before brushing his hair back from his eyes in what might have been the most intimate gesture they had ever shared. She let her fingers linger, momentarily surprised by the softness of his hair – probably just because nothing about Haymitch seemed soft – and then suddenly felt the urge to move her hand to the base of his neck and to tug him closer.

"What...?" he asked.

"A hug, Haymitch," she explained exasperated. "You do grasp the idea, don't you?"

She saw him bristle, battling with himself, his control slipping long enough to let her catch a glimpse of longing on his face. When he moved, it was hesitant, and she wasn't sure until the last moment if he would back away – she hadn't forgotten the way he'd left her standing in his kitchen the last time she'd visited him. Deep down, he must have been starved for human contact, but some habits were hard to break.

It was a testament of how much he must have really needed this, that in the end he gave in without as much as a sarcastic comment.

Katniss watched out of the corner of her eye as Haymitch's hand slowly uncurled from around the bottle and moved to reach for her instead.

He managed to catch her off guard when he sagged against her and she stiffened for a second or two when she felt him resting his head on her shoulder. She looked down at him to find that his eyes were closed. He sighed and adjusted his head a little, almost as if he was nestling, and she had to swallow the emotion clogging her throat when she realised that that was it – that was all he needed, nothing more, nothing less – that he didn't want anything else from her.

So she allowed herself to relax: she buried her nose in his hair to block the smell of liquor in his breath with the scent of shampoo and waited until her heartbeat evened out. She felt Haymitch's breathing deepening as well, his exhales tickling her skin. The house was so quiet that she could hear the ticking of the clock from the other room, and she let the peacefulness of the moment wash over her. Quite frankly, she'd expected this to be uncomfortable, but the feeling never came, which was why she didn't protest when the hug lasted longer than she'd planned. She was reluctant to break the embrace knowing that as soon as she did, it was bound to get awkward. She sighed and ran her fingers through Haymitch's hair, just because she could. She knew that she would probably never get another opportunity to do that.

"Haymitch?" she whispered, but was met with no reply, not even a non-verbal one.

Katniss lifted her head and drew back a little so she could get a good look at Haymitch. His eyes were still closed and his face was calmer than she could recall seeing it in a long time. His head felt heavy on her shoulder. It took her a moment before she realised why he hadn't responded: he was asleep.

"Where were you? It's late."

Katniss closed the door before turning to face her mother.

"Haymitch's," she said simply.

She didn't feel like talking. She'd left Haymitch in his living-room after carefully replacing her shoulder with a pillow and lowering him onto the couch. He didn't wake the whole time. She knew it had been the alcohol and sleep deprivation that had made him flake out on her, rather than the fact that she'd been holding him, but it still showed a level of trust that he'd let himself fall asleep like that.

"What took you so long? I thought you said that you just wanted to check on him?"

She shrugged.

"We talked some."

She was thinking that she should have covered him with a blanket.

"How is he?" her mother surprised her with a question.

Katniss looked at her mom and finally forced herself to focus on the conversation.

"You know Haymitch," she said evasively. "He's drinking again."

She instantly felt bad for painting him in bad light, when she'd been the one to supply him with the booze.

Her mother just sighed and shook her head.

"I know you feel grateful to him, but you really don't have to do this, honey," she said as they walked deeper into the house.

Katniss furrowed her brows.

"What do you mean?"

"You don't have to sit with him, especially when he's drunk. He made his bed."

"What?" Katniss asked sharply stopping.

"I'm just saying, he's a grown man and he's making his own choices. You can't take it upon yourself to try and save him. Some people just don't want others to help them."

"That's not... I don't think that's fair," Katniss argued resuming her walking. She almost said it wasn't true, but it probably was, at least on some level. It wasn't that simple, either, though. "He's not a bad person, mom."

"I'm not saying he is," her mother soothed. "It's just -"

"He really helped me."

"I know, Katniss. Believe me, I was grateful to him myself when I watched you on that screen catching the parachute after you got burned. You don't need to feel like you owe him, though. He was doing his job and..."

"It was more than that," Katniss cut her off flatly, but then she felt herself softening. It wasn't her mom's fault – she assumed, like everybody else, that Haymitch's credit lay solely in talking to the sponsors. They didn't know about all the scheming and careful advice that went on behind the scenes. The only one beside Katniss who knew was Peeta, and she suspected that even he wasn't fully aware of all the unvoiced clues Haymitch had been able to subtly give her right under the Gamemakers noses to steer her toward the right direction while she'd been in the arena. "You don't understand," she said, this time gently. "You can't."

She surprised her mother by kissing her cheek and hurried upstairs leaving the confused woman standing alone.

Once Katniss reached her room, she went straight for the recorder. She had business to finish, one that she needed to put behind her once and for all.

She started with the video she had tried to watch earlier that day, the one from the 51th Hunger Games. This time she intended to go through with it.

She skipped the interviews entirely, fast-forwarding that whole part and played the recording from the moment the gong went off. Perhaps to give the audience something new, in contrast to the Quarter Quell, that year's arena had been a grey, almost deserted place filled with piles of rocks and dangerous cliffs.

Katniss had eyes only for the Twelve tributes. The girl wasn't doing too well. She managed to get away from the Cornucopia and split away from the other tributes. She was alone for the time being, which was probably for the best, but she didn't get anything of use while she was escaping the carnage, so she had no supplies. It was also clear that she didn't have any experience in getting food other than picking berries. Haymitch tried to send her a wire and some pre-crafted wooden parts, since it seemed that she would have had trouble with building a snare otherwise, but even though she managed to put it together after a few tries, she didn't have much luck in catching any game. She just didn't know anything about where she was supposed to set the trap. None of that mattered in the end, because she didn't live long enough to starve to death – on the third day some other tributes found her and slit her throat. Katniss would have liked to be able to say that at least she didn't suffer, seeing that she died quickly, but despite how short the girl's agony had been, Katniss seriously doubted that choking to death on your own blood didn't hurt.

The boy, Haymitch's friend, had more survival skills. He was older and stood much better chance in a fight. He wasn't much of a hunter either, but between what he had found in a care-package he had carried away from the Cornucopia and some inborn resourcefulness, he was managing. He had another problem, though. He got hurt in one of the scuffles – a leg wound that didn't look too bad at first, but wasn't healing properly and soon was clearly infected. Remembering the miracle-working burn ointment she had received during her Games, Katniss wondered why Haymitch hadn't sent him some stronger medicine other than the basic first-aid kit and a mildly-helping salve. The boy had increasingly more trouble with walking and he seemed to have a fever. He definitely needed an antibiotic, yet the time passed, and there were no more parachutes dropping from the sky. At first Katniss couldn't work out what was going on, since she couldn't believe that Haymitch would have just abandoned his tribute without a reason, but then it dawned on her that he must have run out of sponsors willing to pay that much money, so late in the Games. The boy didn't show enough promise, and simply didn't seem that interesting, even having the previous year's victor as his mentor. Haymitch had wasted his resources on the girl, trying to help her, when it was obvious that she wouldn't make it out of the arena. Then he was forced to idly watch his friend slowly wither away, probably cursing Haymitch in his head for not doing anything about it. Katniss couldn't think of a harsher way to learn that particular lesson.

She turned the video off the moment she saw the boy die.

She took a few deep breaths before stubbornly reaching for the next tape.

This time Haymitch's face during the Reaping looked even grimmer, but other than that, she didn't see much of a difference comparing to the previous year – he stood with his back straight and chin high. He certainly wasn't drunk.

She continued the pattern, watching the Reapings and then the Games up to the moment when both of the Twelve tributes were dead, and then skipping to the next year. Most of the time, it didn't take long before she had to switch tapes, anyway. Almost every year one or both tributes didn't even make it away from the Cornucopia. There were a few truly disturbing things she stumbled upon during her session, that she wished she could unsee and forget all about, like the year when the Gamemakers surprised the tributes by dumping them on the completely empty, flat arena and providing them with nothing but weapons, making for a rather short and very bloody Games.

What really shocked Katniss, though, was the recording from about five years after the second Quarter Quell, when one of the Twelve tributes wandered into a swamp. She watched the teenager struggling to get out of the bog and only managing to make things worse by quickening the process of sinking deeper into the trap. There were no trees or other objects nearby that could be used for leverage, even with the aid of a rope, so Katniss was surprised when she saw a parachute falling right into the tribute's hands. It didn't seem like there was anything that could be done, other than waiting for all that to end – probably a little more than an hour, judging from the tempo, so far. The package was very small, which should have been the first warning sign that something was wrong, but Katniss still stared in disbelief when she saw the minuscule bottle tucked neatly inside the silvery box. She knew immediately what it was, and judging from the look on the young tribute's face, she wasn't the only one. The kid looked up at the sky with a questioning look, clearly not wanting to believe it to be the final answer to the problem, and fiddled with the bottle. Survival instinct is a force to be reckoned with, so it wasn't strange at all that the unlucky tribute didn't seem to be pleased with the gift at first, or keen on using it, but as the mud continued to soundlessly creep in, closing to the ribcage-level, it became obvious that there would be no other options available. It was too soon in the Games to hope to outlive the opponents by simply lasting long enough. The only choice was between drowning in the muck and drinking the contents of the vial. And though Katniss wasn't sure how long she herself would have been willing to wait, had she been in the same position, in the end it didn't surprise her when she saw the teenager downing the potion in one big, desperate gulp.

The poison was a fast-working one and designed to bring mercy, not pain, so all there could be heard was a breathy sigh after a few seconds, and then the cannon, signalling the tribute's last breath. The camera showed the bog swallowing the body in what almost looked like a gentle embrace.

And yet, the next tape didn't seem to bring Katniss any resolution. With each Games, Haymitch looked a bit more tired, solemn, and older, but the change was gradual. She wasn't even sure what she was looking for, but she felt like there was something she needed to see. There hadn't seemed to be anything she could pinpoint as a defining moment, a turning point, however, and she started to doubt whether what she was looking for even existed.

It was only when she was almost ready to give up the strange quest she'd put herself through and spare herself watching any more horrors, when she finally stumbled upon something resembling the answer to the enigma that was Haymitch Abernathy.

Nothing in the way that particular Games went seemed to point toward the fact that they might be considered particularly disastrous, at first. In fact, it looked like it wasn't going to be a bad year at all. The tributes were surprisingly promising, considering their home district's usual standards: especially the boy, who must have spent more than a few good months on some hard physical labour, as he'd clearly developed both some strength and stamina prior the Games. It didn't hurt that he was quick-learning either, or that he teamed from the start with another tribute, who proved a quite useful ally as well.

This was the longest Katniss had spent on watching one tape other than Haymitch's Games, up to date. One by one, the rivals fell, including the girl from Twelve, and Katniss found herself counting them down, despite the fact that she knew there was only one way the story could have ended. After all, she was well aware of the fact that Twelve hadn't had a single victor in the years between the second Quarter Quell and her own Games.

Ten more left.

Eight.

Five.

The boy's ally was killed, but he himself managed to escape to safety.

Three.

Good heavens, Katniss thought.

There wasn't even much to do for Haymitch. There was only one instance when the boy needed his help, everything turning out well once Haymitch provided his tribute with what he needed at the moment, but other than that the guy just seemed to be incredibly lucky.

In hindsight, it wasn't that hard to understand why that might prove to be a hard pill to swallow for Haymitch and in consequence make him snap later on. It was with a sense of pity, that she knew he would have hated her for, that Katniss realised that this had probably been the first and maybe only time when Haymitch had let himself believe that this time things could have turned out differently. That there had actually been a chance.

Hope. The most traitorous of feelings. Wasn't it ironic that that would be the thing to undo a man as hardened and cynical as Haymitch?

She had a vague idea of what was going to happen. She just didn't predict as to how it would happen.

She recognised the tactic from her own Games when she saw it: the Gamemakers were herding the remaining tributes for the finale. This time, they used an avalanche to force all the players into running toward one chosen spot. The boy from Twelve was good with avoiding the bigger stones, but it didn't help him one bit when one of the rocks that bounced much higher than the others hit him right in his left brow with enough force to make his entire head whip around. Without fanfare, the boy dropped unconscious –

...or at least that was what Katniss assumed had happened until she heard a cannon blast.

She stared at the unmoving body with what now appeared to be a cracked open skull. She was stunned enough that she didn't turn off the tape right away and saw the female tribute from Two winning the Games after dispatching of her remaining rival.

Katniss switched off the video, not wanting to watch the victor's interview. She stared at the tape in her hands with a heavy heart, before she slowly moved to change it for a new one. She felt like she herself could use a drink right about then, and the thought pulled a wry smirk on her lips. She already had a feeling as to what she was about to see, but she watched it play anyway.

Katniss knew she had been right the moment she saw the shot of the stage in front of the Justice Building from the reaping.

She stopped the recording, and sat in silence for a few minutes, finally understanding what she'd been looking for: the Haymitch that looked back at her from the screen was the one she knew.

She didn't even realise she was crying until she felt something tickling the skin on her cheek and she noticed with surprise that the hand she used to rub the itch off came back wet.

She hit the button on the remote and killed the screen's glow, bathing the room in darkness.

THE END

Tbc?